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UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II<br />
The European Theater of Operations<br />
THE ARDENNES:<br />
BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
by<br />
Hugh M. Cole<br />
CENTER OF MLITARY HISTORY<br />
UNITED STATES ARMY<br />
WASHINGTON, D. C., 1993
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 65-60001<br />
First Printed 1965—CMH Pub 7–8–1<br />
For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing <strong>Of</strong>fice<br />
W<strong>as</strong>hington, D.C. 20402
UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II<br />
Fred C. Cole<br />
W<strong>as</strong>hington and Lee University<br />
James A. Field, Jr.<br />
Swarthmore College<br />
Earl Pomeroy<br />
University of Oregon<br />
Theodore Ropp<br />
Duke University<br />
Stetson Conn, General Editor<br />
Advisory Committee<br />
(As of 1 July 1964)<br />
Lt. Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> E. Griess<br />
United States <strong>Military</strong> Academy<br />
Lt. Gen. August Schomburg<br />
Industrial College of the Armed Forces<br />
Maj. Gen. Hugh M. Exton<br />
U.S. Continental <strong>Army</strong> Command<br />
Brig. Gen. Ward S. Ryan<br />
U.S. <strong>Army</strong> War College<br />
Brig. Gen. Eli<strong>as</strong> C. <strong>To</strong>wnsend<br />
U.S. <strong>Army</strong> Command and General<br />
Staff College<br />
<strong>Of</strong>fice of the Chief of <strong>Military</strong> <strong>History</strong><br />
Brig. Gen. Hal C. Pattison, Chief of <strong>Military</strong> <strong>History</strong><br />
Chief Historian<br />
Chief, Histories Division<br />
Chief, Editorial and Graphics Division<br />
Editor in Chief<br />
iii<br />
Stetson Conn<br />
Col. Albert W. Jones<br />
Col. Walter B. McKenzie<br />
Joseph R. Friedman
... to Those Who Served
Foreword<br />
During most of the eleven months between D-day and V–E day in<br />
Europe, the U.S. <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> carrying on highly successful offensive opera-<br />
tions. As a consequence, the American soldier w<strong>as</strong> buoyed with success,<br />
imbued with the idea that his enemy could not strike him a really heavy<br />
counterblow, and sustained by the conviction that the war w<strong>as</strong> nearly won.<br />
Then, unbelievably, and under the goad of Hitler's fanaticism, the German<br />
<strong>Army</strong> launched its powerful counteroffensive in the Ardennes in December<br />
1944 with the design of knifing through the Allied armies and forcing a<br />
negotiated peace. The mettle of the American soldier w<strong>as</strong> tested in the<br />
fires of adversity and the quality of his response earned for him the right<br />
to stand shoulder to shoulder with his forebears of Valley Forge, Fredericks-<br />
burg, and the Marne.<br />
This is the story of how the Germans planned and executed their<br />
offensive. It is the story of how the high command, American and British,<br />
reacted to defeat the German plan once the reality of a German offensive<br />
w<strong>as</strong> accepted. But most of all it is the story of the American fighting man<br />
and the manner in which he fought a myriad of small defensive battles<br />
until the torrent of the German attack w<strong>as</strong> slowed and diverted, its force<br />
dissipated and finally spent. It is the story of squads, platoons, companies,<br />
and even conglomerate scratch groups that fought with courage, with<br />
fortitude, with sheer obstinacy, often without information or communica-<br />
tions or the knowledge of the w<strong>here</strong>abouts of friends. In less than a fortnight<br />
the enemy w<strong>as</strong> stopped and the Americans were preparing to resume the<br />
offensive. While B<strong>as</strong>togne h<strong>as</strong> become the symbol of this obstinate, gallant,<br />
and successful defense, this work appropriately emph<strong>as</strong>izes the crucial<br />
significance of early American success in containing the attack by holding<br />
firmly on its northern and southern shoulders and by upsetting the enemy<br />
timetable at St. Vith and a dozen lesser known but important and decisive<br />
battlefields.<br />
The hard fighting that preceded the Battle of the Bulge h<strong>as</strong> been re-<br />
counted in two volumes, The Siegfried Line Campaign, and Dr. Cole's<br />
own earlier work, The Lorraine Campaign. Events after it will be related<br />
in The L<strong>as</strong>t <strong>Of</strong>fensive, now in preparation. Two other volumes in this<br />
subseries, The Supreme Command and Logistical Support of the Armies,<br />
Volume II, are useful supplements to the Ardennes volume.<br />
vii
In re-creating the Ardennes battle, the author h<strong>as</strong> penetrated “the fog<br />
of war” <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> any historian can hope to do. No other volume of this<br />
series treats <strong>as</strong> thoroughly or <strong>as</strong> well the teamwork of the combined arms-<br />
infantry and armor, artillery and air, combat engineer and tank destroyer-<br />
or portrays <strong>as</strong> vividly the starkness of small unit combat. Every thoughtful<br />
student of military history, but most especially the student of small unit<br />
tactics, should find the reading of Dr. Cole’s work a rewarding experience.<br />
W<strong>as</strong>hington, D.C.<br />
15 June 1964<br />
viii<br />
HAL C. PATTISON<br />
Brigadier General, <strong>US</strong>A<br />
Chief of <strong>Military</strong> <strong>History</strong>
The Author<br />
Hugh M. Cole received his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in<br />
1937 in the field of European military history. He taught military history at<br />
the University of Chicago until 1942, when he joined the <strong>Army</strong> <strong>as</strong> an intelli-<br />
gence officer. After graduating from the Command and General Staff School<br />
he w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed to the staff of the Third <strong>Army</strong> during its operations in<br />
Europe. At the close of hostilities he became Deputy Theater Historian,<br />
European Theater of Operations. From 1946 to 1952 Dr. Cole<br />
directed the work of the European Theater Section, <strong>Of</strong>fice of the Chief of<br />
<strong>Military</strong> <strong>History</strong>, wrote The Lorraine Campaign, a volume that appeared<br />
in this series in 1950, and undertook much of the work that h<strong>as</strong> culminated<br />
in this volume on the Ardennes Campaign. He joined the Operations<br />
Research <strong>Of</strong>fice of The Johns Hopkins University in 1952 and h<strong>as</strong> continued<br />
his active interest in military history and his service to the <strong>Army</strong> both <strong>as</strong> a<br />
scholar and <strong>as</strong> colonel in the U.S. <strong>Army</strong> Reserve.<br />
ix
Preface<br />
This volume deals with the crucial period of the campaign conducted<br />
in the Belgian Ardennes and Luxembourg, generally known <strong>as</strong> the Battle<br />
of the Bulge. Although the German planning described <strong>here</strong>in antedates<br />
the opening gun by several weeks, the story of the combat operations begins<br />
on 16 December 1944. By 3 January 1945 the German counteroffensive<br />
w<strong>as</strong> at an end, and on that date the Allies commenced an attack that would<br />
take them across the Rhine and into Germany. The l<strong>as</strong>t ph<strong>as</strong>e of operations<br />
in the Ardennes, t<strong>here</strong>fore, is properly part and parcel of the final Allied<br />
offensive in Europe, and so the course of battle beginning on 3 January<br />
1945 is described in another and final volume of this subseries.<br />
The problem of the level of treatment is always difficult in the organiza-<br />
tion and writing of the general staff type of history, which is the design of<br />
this volume. In describing a war of movement, the solution usually h<strong>as</strong><br />
been to concentrate on tactical units smaller than those normally treated<br />
when the war of position obtains. Thus the French General Staff history<br />
of the summer offensive in 1918 abruptly descends from the army corps<br />
to the regiment <strong>as</strong> the appropriate tactical unit to be traced through this<br />
period of mobile operations. The story of the Ardennes Campaign is even<br />
more difficult to organize because of the disappearance, in the first hours,<br />
of a homogeneous front. Churchill’s dictum that the historian’s t<strong>as</strong>k is “to<br />
allot proportion to human events” applies in this instance, although t<strong>here</strong><br />
are limits to the amount of expansion or contraction permissible. Thus the<br />
reader is introduced on 16 December 1944 to battles fought by companies<br />
and platoons because they are meaningful and because the relative impor-<br />
tance of these actions is <strong>as</strong> great <strong>as</strong> operations conducted by regiments or<br />
even divisions later in the story. As the American front congeals and a<br />
larger me<strong>as</strong>ure of tactical control is regained, the narrative follows bat-<br />
talions, then regiments, and then divisions. The building blocks, however,<br />
are the battalion and the regiment. In U.S. <strong>Army</strong> practice during the war<br />
in western Europe, the battalion w<strong>as</strong> in organization and doctrine the b<strong>as</strong>ic<br />
unit, with both tactical and administrative functions. The regiment, in<br />
turn, when organized <strong>as</strong> a regimental combat team w<strong>as</strong> the b<strong>as</strong>ic maneuver<br />
element combining the arms and having staying power. Also, the regiment<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the lowest infantry unit to have a name and a history with which<br />
the soldier could, and did, identify himself.<br />
xi
The Ardennes battle normally w<strong>as</strong> “fought,” in the sense of exercising<br />
decisive command and directing operations, by the corps commander. The<br />
span of tactical control in these widely dispersed actions simply w<strong>as</strong><br />
beyond the physical gr<strong>as</strong>p of higher commanders. These higher commanders<br />
could “influence” the battle only by outlining (in very general terms) the<br />
scheme of maneuver, allocating reserves, and exercising whatever moral<br />
su<strong>as</strong>ion they personally could bring to bear. In other words, “tactics came<br />
before strategy,” <strong>as</strong> Ludendorff wrote of the March offensive in 1918.<br />
For the early days of the Ardennes Campaign the narrative opens each<br />
successive stage of the account by a look at the enemy side of the hill. This,<br />
in fact, is mandatory if the story is to have cohesion and meaning because<br />
the Germans possessed the initiative and because the American forces were<br />
simply reacting to the enemy maneuvers. The account in later chapters<br />
shifts to the American camp in accordance with the me<strong>as</strong>ure to which the<br />
American forces had regained operational freedom.<br />
This volume represents the most exhaustive collection of personal<br />
memoirs by leading participants ever attempted for a general staff history<br />
of a major campaign. The memoirs take two forms: interviews with<br />
American participants shortly after the action described, and written ac-<br />
counts prepared immediately after the end of World War II by the German<br />
officers who took part in the Ardennes Campaign. The use of the combat<br />
interview in the European Theater of Operations w<strong>as</strong> organized by Col.<br />
William A. Ganoe, theater historian, but the specific initiation of an in-<br />
tensive effort to cover the Ardennes story while the battle itself w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
progress must be credited to Col. S. L. A. Marshall. The enlistment of the<br />
German participants in the Ardennes, first <strong>as</strong> involuntary then <strong>as</strong> voluntary<br />
historians, w<strong>as</strong> begun by Colonel Marshall and Capt. Kenneth Hechler,<br />
then developed into a fully organized research program by Col. Harold<br />
Potter, who w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sisted by a very able group of young officers, notably<br />
Captains Howard Hudson, Frank Mahin, and James Scoggins.<br />
The story of the logistics involved in the American operations is treated<br />
at length and in perceptive f<strong>as</strong>hion by Roland G. Ruppenthal, Logistical<br />
Support of the Armies, in two volumes of this subseries. In the main,<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore, the present volume confines itself to the logistical problems of<br />
the German armies. Readers interested in following the course of Allied<br />
relationships at high levels of command, and particularly the operations of<br />
Allied intelligence on the eve of the German offensive, are referred to<br />
Forrest C. Pogue’s The Supreme Command, another volume in this series.<br />
Unfortunately the interest of the United States Air Forces in tactical support<br />
of ground operations w<strong>as</strong> on the wane in the period after World War II<br />
and, <strong>as</strong> a result, a detailed air force history of air-ground co-operation dur-<br />
ing the battle of the Ardennes remains to be written. <strong>To</strong> introduce in full<br />
the effects of the tactical role played by Allied air power during the ground<br />
operations <strong>here</strong> described would require a volume twice the size of this<br />
xii
one. I have tried, however, to keep the role of the air constantly before the<br />
reader, even though the specific actor often is anonymous.<br />
As in my previous volume in the European subseries an attempt is<br />
made to include all awards of the Medal of Honor and the Distinguished<br />
Service Cross. The reader will recognize that deeds of valor do not neces-<br />
sarily coincide with the focal point of a particular action, <strong>as</strong> this is selectively<br />
seen and described by the historian; so it h<strong>as</strong> been necessary to relegate<br />
to the footnotes and cover in very cursory f<strong>as</strong>hion many of these individual<br />
acts of gallantry.<br />
The reader will find no reference to “lessons learned.” This is not<br />
because the history of the Ardennes Campaign is so antique <strong>as</strong> to lack a<br />
useful application to modern military thought or planning for the future.<br />
On the contrary, the operations in the Ardennes show in real life tactical<br />
forms and formations which (in such things <strong>as</strong> dispersal, gaps between units,<br />
counterattack doctrine, widths of front, and fluidity of movement) are com-<br />
parable to those taught by current <strong>Army</strong> doctrine and envisaged for the<br />
future. Nonetheless, the most valuable lessons which might be derived from<br />
the study of this campaign would lead inevitably to a consideration of special<br />
weapons effects and their impact on military operations, which in turn would<br />
result in a restrictive security cl<strong>as</strong>sification for the volume. I hope, however,<br />
that the <strong>Army</strong> service schools will find it fruitful to make the extrapolation<br />
that cannot be made <strong>here</strong>.<br />
The maps consulted by the author were those in use at the end of 1944.<br />
They include the U.S. <strong>Army</strong> reproductions of the maps prepared by the<br />
British Geographical Section, General Staff, in the 1 : 25,000 series (G.S.,<br />
G.S. 4041), the 1 : 50,000 series (G.S., G.S. 4040), and the 1 : 100,000 series<br />
(G.S., G.S. 4336 and 4416). The most useful German map proved to be<br />
the 1 : 200,000 Strussenkurte von Belgien, a copy of the French Michelin<br />
road map, issued to German troops <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> 1940 and, in an English<br />
version, used by American armored units. Some of the terrain in question<br />
is familiar to me, but this personal knowledge h<strong>as</strong> been augmented by an<br />
extensive use of photographs. Shortly after World War II pilots of the<br />
45th Reconnaissance Squadron, <strong>US</strong>AF, under the supervision of Maj. John<br />
C. Hatlem, flew photographic missions designated by the author, over<br />
terrain in Luxembourg and Belgium. In addition some special ground<br />
photographs were made. The total collection numbers two hundred and<br />
sixteen photographs and h<strong>as</strong> proved invaluable in writing this story.<br />
References to clock time are on the twenty-four hour system. Fortu-<br />
nately for the reader (and the writer), the Allies converted to British<br />
summer time on 17 September 1944 and the Germans went back to middle<br />
European time on 2 October 1944; <strong>as</strong> a result both forces used the same<br />
clock time in the Ardennes. Sunrise on 16 December 1944 came at 0829<br />
and sunset occurred at 1635 (using B<strong>as</strong>togne, Belgium, <strong>as</strong> a reference<br />
point). The brevity of daylight is an important tactical feature of this<br />
xiii
history, and the reader should note that dawn and dusk (morning and<br />
evening twilight) each added only thirty-eight minutes to the hours of<br />
light.<br />
A host of participants in the Ardennes battle have answered questions<br />
posed by the author, provided personal papers, and read a part or the whole<br />
of the draft manuscript. Their <strong>as</strong>sistance h<strong>as</strong> been invaluable.<br />
Although this volume took an unconscionably long while to write, my<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k w<strong>as</strong> made much e<strong>as</strong>ier by the initial efforts of Captains Blair Clark,<br />
Howard Hudson, Robert Merriam, and George Tuttle, who spent several<br />
months at the close of the war in gathering the sources and preparing first<br />
drafts for a history of the Ardennes Campaign. In the <strong>Of</strong>fice of the Chief<br />
of <strong>Military</strong> <strong>History</strong>, Mrs. Magna Bauer, Charles V. P. von Luttichau, and<br />
Royce L. Thompson worked over a period of years in gathering data and<br />
writing research papers for use in the volume. The reader of the footnotes<br />
will obtain some slight me<strong>as</strong>ure of my obligation to these three.<br />
In preparation for publication, Mr. Joseph R. Friedman, Editor in<br />
Chief, OCMH, h<strong>as</strong> given this volume devoted attention, and Mrs. Loretto<br />
C. Stevens of the Editorial Branch h<strong>as</strong> shepherded it through the final steps<br />
of editing. Mr. Billy C. Mossman prepared the maps, Miss Ruth A. Phillips<br />
selected the photographs, and Miss Margaret L. Emerson compiled the<br />
index.<br />
Finally, I am indebted to my secretary, Mrs. Muriel Southwick, without<br />
whose exhortations and reminders this book might never have been com-<br />
pleted.<br />
For any errors of fact or flaws of interpretation that may occur in this<br />
work, the author alone is responsible.<br />
W<strong>as</strong>hington, D.C. HUGH M. COLE<br />
15 June 1964<br />
xiv
Contents<br />
Chapter Page<br />
1<br />
. THE ORIGINS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1<br />
Hitler’s Perspective. September 1944 . . . . . . . . .<br />
How the Plan W<strong>as</strong> Born . . . . . . . . . . . . .<br />
3<br />
9<br />
II . PLANNING THE COUNTEROFFENSIVE . . . . . . . 19<br />
Details of the Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19<br />
The Big Solution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27<br />
A Double Envelopment? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29<br />
III . TROOPS AND TERRAIN ............. 33<br />
The Order of Battle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33<br />
The Allies Return to the Attack .......... 36<br />
The Terrain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39<br />
IV . PREPARATIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48<br />
Deception and Camouflage . . . . . . . . . . . . 48<br />
The Western Front in Early December . . . . . . . . 51<br />
The Intelligence Failure ............. 56<br />
The German Concentration ............ 63<br />
V . THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY ATTACK . . . . . . . 75<br />
The 99th Division Sector . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77<br />
The Initial Attack. 16 December . . . . . . . . . . 80<br />
The First Attacks in the Monschau-Höfen Sector<br />
Are Repulsed. 16 December . . . . . . . . . . 86<br />
The German Effort Continues. 17-18 December . . . . . 90<br />
Losheimergraben Is Lost . . . . . . . . . . . * 92<br />
The German Attack <strong>To</strong>ward Rocherath and Krinkelt.<br />
16-17 December . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95<br />
The 395th Infantry Conforms to the Withdrawal . . . . 101<br />
The 2d Division Gives Up the Wahlerscheid Attack . . . . 103<br />
The 394th Infantry Abandons the Mürringen Position . . 105<br />
xv
Chapter Page<br />
VI . THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 107<br />
The 2d Division Withdraws . . . . . . . . . . . . 107<br />
The 1st Infantry Division Sends Reinforcements to<br />
Butgenbach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112<br />
The Defense of the Twin Villages. 18 December . . . . . 113<br />
The L<strong>as</strong>t Attack at Höfen Fails. 18 December ...... 119<br />
The 2d Division Withdraws to the Elsenborn Line.<br />
19 December . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120<br />
The Enemy Tries the Western Flank. 19-23 December . . 128<br />
VII . BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL . . . . . . 136<br />
Introductory Note . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136<br />
Dispositions of the 106th Infantry Division . . . . . . 137<br />
Enemy Preparations for Another Cannae . . . . . . . 142<br />
TheAttack in theLosheim Gap . . . . . . . . . . . 145<br />
The Attack Hits the 106th Division . . . . . . . . . 151<br />
The 424th Infantry and CCB, 9th Armored . . . . . . . 158<br />
Cannae in the Schnee Eifel . . . . . . . . . . . . 161<br />
The Question of Air Resupply . . . . . . . . . . . 171<br />
VIII . THE FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS THE 28TH<br />
INFANTRY DIVISION . . . . . . . . . . . . 173<br />
The 110th Infantry Sector. 26-18 December . . . . . . 176<br />
The 212th Infantry Sector. 16-20 December . . . . . . 193<br />
The Fall of Wiltz . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205<br />
IX . THE ATTACK BY THE GERMAN LEFT WING: 16-20<br />
DECEMBER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212<br />
The 109th Infantry Defense on the Sauer and Our<br />
Rivers. 16-20 December . . . . . . . . . . . . 214<br />
Elements of the 9th Armored Division Battle at the<br />
Sauer. 26-20 December . . . . . . . . . . . . 227<br />
X . THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED . . 238<br />
The German Thrust Begins . . . . . . . . . . . . 240<br />
Southern Flank-A Summing Up . . . . . . . . . . 258<br />
XI . THE 1ST SS PANZER DIVISION'S DASH WESTWARD. AND<br />
OPERATION GREIF . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259<br />
Kampfgruppe Peiper on the Move . . . . . . . . . . 260<br />
Operation Greif . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269<br />
XII . THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST . VITH . . . . . . . . . 272<br />
The 7th Armored Division Move to St . Vith . . . . . . . 273<br />
The Enemy Strikes at the St . Vith Perimeter . . . . . . 280<br />
xvi
Chapter Page<br />
XIII . VIII CORPS ATTEMPTS TO DELAY THE ENEMY .... 294<br />
CCR, 9th Armored Division. and the Road to B<strong>as</strong>togne . . 294<br />
The Advance of the XLVII Panzer Corps . . . . . . . 298<br />
Team Cherry on the Longvilly Road . . . . . . . . . 300<br />
The 101st Airborne Division Moves Into B<strong>as</strong>togne . . . . 305<br />
XIV . THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES . . . . . . . . . . 310<br />
Middleton’s First Moves . . . . . . . . . . . . . 311<br />
The Gap North of B<strong>as</strong>togne . . . . . . . . . . . . 316<br />
Defense Southwest of B<strong>as</strong>togne . . . . . . . . . . . 322<br />
Renewed Drive Around B<strong>as</strong>togne . . . . . . . . . . 323<br />
XV . THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST ... 330<br />
The 30th Division Meets Peiper . . . . . . . . . . . 334<br />
The West Flank of the XVIII Airborne Corps. 20 December 352<br />
Action in Front of the XVIII Airborne Corps Right Wing.<br />
20 December . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 354<br />
The Net Closes on Peiper . . . . . . . . . . . . . 359<br />
XVI . ONE THREAT SUBSIDES; ANOTHER EMERGES . . . . 368<br />
The Attempt <strong>To</strong> Relieve Peiper’s Kampfgruppe ..... 368<br />
The 3d Armored Division Is Checked. 21-23 December . . 377<br />
The Fight at the Baraque de Fraiture Crossroads. 23 December 388<br />
XVII . ST . VITH IS LOST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 393<br />
The Defenders of St . Vith P<strong>as</strong>s to the XVIII Airborne Corps 393<br />
The Enemy Closes on the St . Vith Salient . . . . . . . 401<br />
The Final Withdrawal From the St . Vith Sector . . . . . 407<br />
XVIII . THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT . . 423<br />
Division of the Battlefield . . . . . . . . . . . . 423<br />
The VII Corps Assembles .............. 427<br />
German Armor Advances on the VII Corps ....... 435<br />
The Main Battle Is Joined. 24 and 25 December . . . . 438<br />
XIX . THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE . . . . . . . . . . . 445<br />
The Initial Deployment E<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne . . . . . . . 445<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne Is Encircled . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459<br />
The Enemy Begins a Concentric Attack . . . . . . . . 464<br />
The Battle on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day . . . . . . . . . . . . 478<br />
XX . THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 482<br />
The End of the Defensive Battle. 22 December . . . . . 482<br />
The XII Corps Moves to Luxembourg . . . . . . . . 485<br />
The XII Corps’ Counterattack . . . . . . . . . . . 489<br />
xvii
Chapter<br />
XXI . THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD<br />
BASTOGNE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 509<br />
Preparations for the Attack . . . . . . . . . . . . 509<br />
The 80th Division Advance . . . . . . . . . . . . 515<br />
The 26th Infantry Division Attack . . . . . . . . . . 520<br />
The 4th Armored Division Attack . . . . . . . . . . 523<br />
The 80th Division Battle in the Woods. 25-26 December . . 532<br />
The 26th Division Fight for a Bridgehead on the Sure.<br />
24-27 December . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 540<br />
The 4th Armored Division Reaches B<strong>as</strong>togne . . . . . . 547<br />
XXII . THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E . . . . . . . .. 556<br />
The Meuse River Line . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 556<br />
The Meuse Seems Within Reach . . . . . . . . .. 562<br />
The Celles Pocket . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 565<br />
The Fight at Humain . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 570<br />
The Fight at Verdenne . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 574<br />
XXIII . THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE<br />
OURTHE: 24 DECEMBER–2 JANUARY . . . . 578 .<br />
The Battle at the Manhay Crossroads . . . . . . . .. 583<br />
The Fight in the Aisne Valley . . . . . . . . . .. 593<br />
The 2d SS Panzer Is Halted . . . . . . . . . . . . 595<br />
The 82d Airborne Withdraws From the Salm River Line .. 598<br />
“The Sad Sack Affair” . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 601<br />
The Elsenborn Shoulder . . . . . . . . . . . .. 603<br />
XXIV . THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE . . . . . . . . . .. 606<br />
Widening the B<strong>as</strong>togne Corridor . . . . . . . . .. 606<br />
The Opposing Grand Tactics . . . . . . . . . .. 610<br />
The Sibret-Villeroux Actions . . . . . . . . . .. 615<br />
The Two Attacks Collide . . . . . . . . . . . . . 617<br />
The III Corps Joins the Attack . . . . . . . . . .. 627<br />
The Lone Battle of the 26th Division ....... .. 637<br />
The VIII Corps’ Attack Continues ....... . . 643<br />
XXV . EPILOGUE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 649<br />
The Weather . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 649<br />
The Opposing Troop Strengths . . . . . . . . . . . 650<br />
The Opposing Weapons . . . . . . . . . . . . . 651<br />
The Artillery Arm in the Ardennes . . . . . . . . . 656<br />
The Air Weapon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 660<br />
Logistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 663<br />
The Turning Point in the Ardennes . . . . . . . . . 668<br />
The Place of the Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive in World War II . . 673<br />
Appendix<br />
A . TABLE OF EQUIVALENT RANKS . . . . . . . . . . 677<br />
B . RECIPIENTS OF THE DISTINGUISHED SERVICE CROSS 678<br />
xviii<br />
Page
Page<br />
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 680<br />
GLOSSARY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 682<br />
BASIC MILITARY MAP SYMBOLS . . . . . . . . . . . . . 685<br />
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 689<br />
Maps<br />
No. Page<br />
I. The Western Front, 15 December 1944 . . . . . . . . . . 52<br />
2. The XVIII Airborne Corps Meets Kampfgruppe Peiper,<br />
20-25 December 1944 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347<br />
3. The XVIII Airborne Corps West Flank, 20 December 1944 . . . 355<br />
4. B<strong>as</strong>togne, 25-26 December 1944 . . . . . . . . . . . . 473<br />
Maps I-X Are in Accompanying Map Envelope<br />
I. The Ardennes Counteroffensive: The German Plan, December 1944<br />
II. The Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> Attack, 16-19 December 1944<br />
III. The LXVI Corps Attacks the 106th Infantry Division,<br />
16-19 December 1944<br />
IV. The Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> Attacks the 28th Infantry Division,<br />
16-19 December 1944<br />
V. The Seventh <strong>Army</strong> Attack, 16-19 December 1944<br />
VI. B<strong>as</strong>togne, 19-23 December 1944<br />
VII. The XVIII Airborne Corps Sector, 21-23 December 1944<br />
VIII. Between the Salm and the Meuse, 24-27 December 1944<br />
IX. The Southern Shoulder, 22-26 December 1944<br />
X. Widening the B<strong>as</strong>togne Corridor, 24 December 1944-2 January<br />
1945<br />
Illustrations<br />
Page<br />
Adolf Hitler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2<br />
Generaloberst Alfred Jodl . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16<br />
Generalfeldmarschall Gerd von Rundstedt . . . . . . . . . . . 23<br />
Generalfeldmarschall Walter Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24<br />
Noville and Stolzemberg . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41<br />
xix
Page<br />
Lt . Gen . Omar N . Bradley. Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur W . Tedder.<br />
General Dwight D . Eisenhower. and Field Marshal Sir Bernard L .<br />
Montgomery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54<br />
Maj . Gen . Troy H . Middleton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55<br />
Panzerkumpfwagens V (Panther) on the Way to the Front . . . . . . 60<br />
Generaloberst der Waffen-SS Josef Dietrich . . . . . . . . . . . 76<br />
Snow Scene Near Krinkelt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79<br />
Losheimergraben . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84<br />
Constructing a Winterized Squad Hut . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88<br />
Camouflaged Pillbox Serving <strong>as</strong> Command Post . . . . . . . . . 100<br />
Maj . Gen . Leonard T . Gerow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103<br />
2d Division Infantrymen on the March . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108<br />
26th Infantry Area Near Butgenbach . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114<br />
Captured German Tank Crewman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118<br />
99th Infantry Division Vehicles Moving Through Wirtzfeld . . . . . 121<br />
Gun Position on Elsenborn Ridge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124<br />
Wrecked German Tank Showing “Bazooka Pants” . . . . . . . . . 127<br />
American Prisoners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169<br />
General der Panzertruppen H<strong>as</strong>so von Manteuffel . . . . . . . . 174<br />
General der Panzertruppen Heinrich F . Luettwitz . . . . . . . . . 174<br />
German Troops P<strong>as</strong>sing Abandoned American Equipment . . . . . 183<br />
Clerf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189<br />
Ouren. Showing Bridges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200<br />
Wiltz . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210<br />
Ettelbruck . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224<br />
Cave Refuge for Civilians . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227<br />
Wallendorf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228<br />
Belgian Woman Salvaging Burned Grain . . . . . . . . . . . 233<br />
Breitweiler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246<br />
Lt . Gen . Courtney H . Hodges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259<br />
Kampfgruppe Peiper . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262<br />
M<strong>as</strong>sacred American Soldiers Near Malmedy . . . . . . . . . . 263<br />
Traffic Jam in St . Vith Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276<br />
Railroad Yards at Gouvy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287<br />
Antitank Gunners Guarding a Crossing. Vielsalm . . . . . . . . 288<br />
Brig . Gen . Anthony C . McAuliffe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306<br />
Paratroopers of 101st Airborne Near B<strong>as</strong>togne . . . . . . . . . . 308<br />
La Roche and the Ourthe River . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314<br />
Combat Engineer Setting a Charge . . . . . . . . . . . . . 326<br />
Amblève River Bridge at Stavelot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 338<br />
Maj . Gen . Matthew B . Ridgway and Maj . Gen . James M . Gavin . . . 344<br />
Troops of 325th Glider Infantry Moving Through Fog . . . . . . . 346<br />
Stoumont . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350<br />
Mined Bridge at Malmédy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 360<br />
xx
Page<br />
German Tank Disguised <strong>as</strong> an American Tank . . . . . . . . . 362<br />
105-mm. Howitzers M7 in Action Near La Gleize . . . . . . . . . 375<br />
Baraque de Fraiture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .<br />
. . . . 388<br />
St.Vith . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 394<br />
Chérain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 399<br />
Tanks of the 7th Armored Division Near St . Vith . . . . . . . . 408<br />
Car Bearing General Bradley Fords a Belgian River . . . . . . . . 425<br />
Maj . Gen . J . Lawton Collins, Field Marshal Montgomery. and<br />
General Ridgway . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 426<br />
Hotton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 430<br />
MP’s Checking Vehicles Near Marche . . . . . . . . . . . . . 432<br />
Captured German 88-mm . Gun . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 439<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 446<br />
C<strong>as</strong>ualties in an Improvised Emergency Ward . . . . . . . . . . 467<br />
SuppIy by Air . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469<br />
A B<strong>as</strong>togne Street After Luftwaffe Bombardment . . . . . . . . . 476<br />
Maj . Gen . Manton S . Eddy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 485<br />
Lt . Gen . George S . Patton. Jr . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 487<br />
5th Infantry Division Troops Moving <strong>To</strong>ward the Front . . . . . . 49 1<br />
A White Phosphorus Burst . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 496<br />
Scheidgen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 498<br />
White-Clad 11th Infantry Troops Attack <strong>To</strong>ward Haller . . . . . . 500<br />
Müllerthal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 502<br />
Berdorf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 505<br />
Maj . Gen . John Millikin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 510<br />
Heiderscheidergrund Bridge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 519<br />
Watching a Dogfight Between American and Luftwaffe Planes . . . . 527<br />
4th Armored Division Rolling <strong>To</strong>ward Chaumont . . . . . . . . 528<br />
Esch-sur-Sure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 547<br />
American Troops in Tintange . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 549<br />
German Prisoners Carrying Wounded . . . . . . . . . .... 550<br />
British Tank Patrolling the Meuse at Namur . . . . . . . . . . 558<br />
Civilian Refugees at Dinant Bridge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 562<br />
Marche . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 563<br />
2d Armored Division Infantrymen Moving to New Positions . . . . . 573<br />
Prime Mover <strong>To</strong>wing 8-Inch Howitzer . . . . . . . . . . . . 582<br />
Manhay Crossroads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 584<br />
Elements of 3d Armored Division Advancing Near Manhay . . . . . 586<br />
Troops of the 84th Infantry Division Digging In ..... .... 588<br />
Destruction of Grandménil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 597<br />
Supplies Moving Through B<strong>as</strong>togne . . . . . . . . . . . . . 608<br />
M<strong>as</strong>sed Half-Tracks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 618<br />
35th Infantry Division Machine Gunners . . . . . . . . . . . . 624<br />
xxi
Page<br />
Bed Sheets Used <strong>as</strong> Camouflage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 631<br />
6th Armored Division Tanks in Snowstorm . . . . . . . . . . . 634<br />
Medics Removing C<strong>as</strong>ualties. Lutrebois . . . . . . . . . . . . 636<br />
Kaundorf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 639<br />
All illustrations are from Department of Defense files. with the exception of<br />
the photograph on page 76 (General Dietrich) reproduced through the courtesy<br />
of the Central Intelligence Agency. and the one on page 174 (General von<br />
Luettwitz) , taken from captured German records in the National Archives .<br />
xxii
The U.S. <strong>Army</strong> <strong>Center</strong> of <strong>Military</strong> <strong>History</strong><br />
The <strong>Center</strong> of <strong>Military</strong> <strong>History</strong> prepares and publishes histories <strong>as</strong> re-<br />
quired by the U.S. <strong>Army</strong>. It coordinates <strong>Army</strong> historical matters, including<br />
historical properties, and supervises the <strong>Army</strong> museum system. It also<br />
maintains liaison with public and private agencies and individuals to stimu-<br />
late interest and study in the field of military history. The <strong>Center</strong> is located<br />
at 1099 14th Street, N.W., W<strong>as</strong>hington, D.C. 20005-3402.<br />
xxiii
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE
On Saturday, 16 September 1944, the<br />
daily Fuehrer Conference convened in<br />
the Wolf’s Lair, Hitler’s E<strong>as</strong>t Prussian<br />
headquarters. No special word had<br />
come in from the battle fronts and the<br />
briefing soon ended, the conference dis-<br />
banding to make way for a session be-<br />
tween Hitler and members of what had<br />
become his household military staff.<br />
Wilhelm Keitel and Alfred Jodl were<br />
in this second conference. So w<strong>as</strong> Heinz<br />
Guderian, who <strong>as</strong> acting chief of staff<br />
for OKH held direct military responsi-<br />
bility for the conduct of operations on<br />
the Russian front.<br />
Herman Goering w<strong>as</strong> absent. From<br />
this fact stems the limited knowledge<br />
available of the initial appearance of<br />
the idea which would be translated into<br />
historical fact <strong>as</strong> the Ardennes counter-<br />
offensive or Battle of the Bulge. Goer-<br />
ing and the Luftwaffe were represented<br />
by Werner Kreipe, chief of staff for<br />
OKL. Perhaps Kreipe had been in-<br />
structed by Goering to report fully on<br />
all that Hitler might say; perhaps Kreipe<br />
w<strong>as</strong> a habitual diary-keeper. In any<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e he had consistently violated the<br />
Fuehrer ordinance that no notes of the<br />
daily conferences should be retained ex-<br />
cept the official transcript made by<br />
Hitler’s own stenographic staff.<br />
Trenchant, almost cryptic, Kreipe’s<br />
notes outline the scene. Jodl, represent-<br />
ing OKW and thus the headquarters<br />
CHAPTER I<br />
The Origins<br />
responsible for managing the war on the<br />
Western Front, began the briefing. 1 In<br />
a quiet voice and with the usual adroit<br />
use of phr<strong>as</strong>es designed to lessen the<br />
impact of information which the Fuehrer<br />
might find dist<strong>as</strong>teful, Jodl reviewed the<br />
relative strength of the opposing forces.<br />
The Western Allies possessed 96 divi-<br />
sions at or near the front; these were<br />
faced by 55 German divisions. An<br />
estimated 10 Allied divisions were en<br />
route from the United Kingdom to the<br />
battle zone. Allied airborne units still<br />
remained in England (some of these<br />
would make a dramatic appearance the<br />
very next day at Arnhem and Nijme-<br />
gen). Jodl added a few words about<br />
shortages on the German side, shortages<br />
in tanks, heavy weapons, and ammuni-<br />
tion. This w<strong>as</strong> a persistent and unpopu-<br />
lar topic; Jodl must have slid quickly<br />
to the next item–a report on the German<br />
forces withdrawing from southern and<br />
southwestern France.<br />
Suddenly Hitler cut Jodl short. T<strong>here</strong><br />
ensued a few minutes of strained silence.<br />
Then Hitler spoke, his words recalled<br />
<strong>as</strong> faithfully <strong>as</strong> may be by the listening<br />
1 MS # P–069, The Kreipe Diary, 22 July-2<br />
November 1944 (General der Flieger Werner<br />
Kreipe). OKH, OKL, and OKW are the ab-<br />
breviated versions, respectively, of Oberkommando<br />
des Heeres, the High Command of the German<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, Oberkommando der Luftwaffe, The Luft-<br />
waffe High Command, and Oberkommando der<br />
Wehrmacht, the Armed Forces High Command.
2<br />
ADOLF HITLER<br />
OKL chief of staff. “I have just made<br />
a momentous decision. I shall go over<br />
to the counter-attack, that is to say”–<br />
and he pointed to the map unrolled on<br />
the desk before him—“<strong>here</strong>, out of the<br />
Ardennes, with the objective–Antwerp.”<br />
While his audience sat in stunned si-<br />
lence, the Fuehrer began to outline his<br />
plan.<br />
Historical hindsight may give the im-<br />
pression that only a leader finally bereft<br />
of sanity could, in mid-September of<br />
1944, believe Germany physically capa-<br />
ble of delivering one more powerful<br />
and telling blow. Politically the Third<br />
Reich stood deserted and friendless.<br />
F<strong>as</strong>cist Italy and the once powerful Axis<br />
were finished. Japan had politely sug-<br />
gested that Germany should start peace<br />
negotiations with the Soviets. In south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern Europe, <strong>as</strong> the month of August<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
closed, the Rumanians and Bulgarians<br />
had h<strong>as</strong>tened to switch sides and join<br />
the victorious Russians. Finland had<br />
broken with Germany on 2 September.<br />
Hungary and the ephemeral Croat<br />
“state” continued in dubious battle be-<br />
side Germany, held in place by German<br />
divisions in the line and German garri-<br />
sons in their respective capitals. But the<br />
twenty nominal Hungarian divisions and<br />
an equivalent number of Croatian<br />
brigades were in effect canceled by the<br />
two Rumanian armies which had joined<br />
the Russians.<br />
The defection of Rumanian, Bulgar-<br />
ian, and Finnish forces w<strong>as</strong> far less im-<br />
portant than the terrific losses suffered<br />
by the German armies themselves in<br />
the summer of 1944. On the E<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
and Western Fronts the combined<br />
German losses during June, July, and<br />
August had totaled at le<strong>as</strong>t 1,200,000<br />
dead, wounded, and missing. The rapid<br />
Allied advances in the west had cooped<br />
up an additional 230,000 troops in posi-<br />
tions from which they would emerge<br />
only to surrender. Losses in materiel<br />
were in keeping with those in fighting<br />
manpower.<br />
Room for maneuver had been whit-<br />
tled away at a fant<strong>as</strong>tically rapid rate.<br />
On the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front the Soviet summer<br />
offensive had carried to the borders of<br />
E<strong>as</strong>t Prussia, across the Vistula at a num-<br />
ber of points, and up to the northern<br />
Carpathians. Only a small slice of<br />
Rumania w<strong>as</strong> left to German troops.<br />
By mid-September the German occupa-<br />
tion forces in southern Greece and the<br />
Greek islands (except Crete) already<br />
were withdrawing <strong>as</strong> the German gr<strong>as</strong>p<br />
on the Balkans weakened.<br />
On the Western Front the Americans<br />
had, in the second week of September,
THE ORIGINS 3<br />
put troops on the soil of the Third<br />
Reich, in the Aachen sector, while the<br />
British had entered Holland. The<br />
German armies in the west faced a<br />
containing Allied front reaching from<br />
the Swiss border to the North Sea. On<br />
14 September the newly appointed<br />
German commander in the west, Gen-<br />
eralfeldmarschall Gerd von Rundstedt,<br />
acknowledged that the “Battle for the<br />
West Wall” had begun.<br />
On the Italian front Generalfeld-<br />
marschall Albert Kesselring’s two armies<br />
retained position <strong>as</strong>tride the Apennines<br />
and, from the Gothic Line, defended<br />
northern Italy. Here, of all the active<br />
fronts, the German forces faced the<br />
enemy on something like equal terms-<br />
except in the air. Nonetheless the Allies<br />
were dangerously close to the southern<br />
entrances to the Po Valley.<br />
In the far north the defection of<br />
Finland had introduced a bizarre opera-<br />
tional situation. In northern Finland<br />
and on the Murmansk front nine Ger-<br />
man divisions held what earlier had<br />
been the left wing of the 700-mile Finno-<br />
German front. Now the Finns no<br />
longer were allies, but neither were<br />
they ready to turn their arms against<br />
Generaloberst Dr. Lothar Rendulic and<br />
his nine German divisions. The Soviets<br />
likewise showed no great interest in<br />
conducting a full-scale campaign in the<br />
subarctic. With Finland out of the war,<br />
however, the German troops had no<br />
worthwhile mission remaining except to<br />
stand guard over the Petsamo nickel<br />
mines. Only a month after Mannerheim<br />
took Finland out of the war, Hitler<br />
would order the evacuation of that<br />
country and of northern Norway.<br />
Political and military reverses so<br />
severe <strong>as</strong> those sustained- by the Third<br />
Reich in the summer of 1944 necessarily<br />
implied severe economic losses to a state<br />
and a war machine fed and grown strong<br />
on the proceeds of conquest. Rumanian<br />
oil, Finnish and Norwegian nickel, cop-<br />
per, and molybdenum, Swedish high-<br />
grade iron ore, Russian manganese,<br />
French bauxite, Yugoslavian copper,<br />
and Spanish mercury were either lost<br />
to the enemy or denied by the neutrals<br />
who saw the tide of war turning against<br />
a once powerful customer.<br />
Hitler’s Perspective<br />
September 1944<br />
In retrospect, the German position<br />
after the summer reverses of 1944 seemed<br />
indeed hopeless and the only rational<br />
rele<strong>as</strong>e a quick peace on the best possi-<br />
ble terms. But the contemporary scene<br />
<strong>as</strong> viewed from Hitler’s headquarters in<br />
September 1944, while hardly roseate,<br />
even to the Fuehrer, w<strong>as</strong> not an un-<br />
relieved picture of despair and gloom.<br />
In the west what had been an Allied<br />
advance of <strong>as</strong>tounding speed had de-<br />
celerated <strong>as</strong> rapidly, the long Allied<br />
supply lines, reaching clear back to the<br />
English Channel and the Côte d’Azur,<br />
acting <strong>as</strong> a tether which could be<br />
stretched only so far. The famous West<br />
Wall fortifications (almost dismantled<br />
in the years since 1940) had not yet been<br />
heavily engaged by the attacker, while<br />
to the rear lay the great moat which<br />
historically had separated the German<br />
people from their enemies–the Rhine.<br />
On the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front the se<strong>as</strong>onal surge<br />
of battle w<strong>as</strong> beginning to ebb, the<br />
Soviet summer offensive seemed to have<br />
run its course, and despite continuing<br />
battle on the flanks the center had<br />
relapsed into an une<strong>as</strong>y calm.
4 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Even the overwhelming superiority<br />
which the Western Allies possessed in<br />
the air had failed thus far to bring the<br />
Third Reich groveling to its knees <strong>as</strong><br />
so many proponents of the air arm had<br />
predicted, In September the British and<br />
Americans could mount a daily bomber<br />
attack of over 5,000 planes, but the<br />
German will to resist and the means of<br />
resistance, so far <strong>as</strong> then could be me<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ured, remained quite sufficient for a<br />
continuation of the war.<br />
Great, gaping wounds, w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
Allied bombers had struck, disfigured<br />
most of the larger German cities west<br />
of the Elbe, but German discipline and<br />
a re<strong>as</strong>onably efficient warning and shelter<br />
system had reduced the daily loss of life<br />
to what the German people themselves<br />
would reckon <strong>as</strong> “acceptable.” If any-<br />
thing, the lesson of London w<strong>as</strong> being<br />
repeated, the noncombatant will to re-<br />
sist hardening under the continuous<br />
blows from the air and forged still<br />
harder by the Allied announcements of<br />
an unconditional surrender policy.<br />
The material means available to the<br />
armed forces of the Third Reich ap-<br />
peared relatively unaffected by the<br />
ce<strong>as</strong>eless hammering from the air. It is<br />
true that the German war economy w<strong>as</strong><br />
not geared to meet a long-drawn war<br />
of attrition. But Reich Minister Albert<br />
Speer and his cohorts had been given<br />
over two years to rationalize, reorganize,<br />
disperse, and expand the German econ-<br />
omy before the intense Allied air<br />
efforts of 1944. So successful w<strong>as</strong> Speer’s<br />
program and so industrious were the<br />
labors of the home front that the race<br />
between Allied destruction and German<br />
construction (or reconstruction) w<strong>as</strong><br />
being run neck and neck in the third<br />
quarter of 1944, the period, that is, dur-<br />
ing which Hitler instituted the far-reach-<br />
ing military plans eventuating in the<br />
Ardennes counteroffensive.<br />
The ball-bearing and aircraft in-<br />
dustries, major Allied air targets during<br />
the first half of 1944, had taken heavy<br />
punishment but had come back with<br />
amazing speed. By September bearing<br />
production w<strong>as</strong> very nearly what it had<br />
been just before the dubious honor of<br />
nomination <strong>as</strong> top-priority target for the<br />
Allied bombing effort. The production<br />
of single-engine fighters had risen from<br />
1,016 in February to a high point of<br />
3,031 such aircraft in September. The<br />
Allied strategic attack leveled at the<br />
synthetic oil industry, however, showed<br />
more immediate results, <strong>as</strong> reflected in<br />
the charts which Speer put before Hitler.<br />
For aviation g<strong>as</strong>oline, motor g<strong>as</strong>oline,<br />
and diesel oil, the production curve<br />
dipped sharply downward and lingered<br />
far below monthly consumption figures<br />
despite the radical drop in fuel con-<br />
sumption in the summer of 1944. Am-<br />
munition production likewise had<br />
declined markedly under the air<br />
campaign against the synthetic oil in-<br />
dustry, in this c<strong>as</strong>e the synthetic nitrogen<br />
procedures. In September the German<br />
armed forces were firing some 70,000<br />
tons of explosives, while production<br />
amounted to only half that figure.<br />
Shells and c<strong>as</strong>ings were still unaffected<br />
except for special items which required<br />
the ferroalloys hitherto procured from<br />
the Soviet Union, France, and the<br />
Balkans.<br />
Although in the later summer of 1944<br />
the Allied air forces turned their bombs<br />
against German armored vehicle pro-<br />
duction (an appetizing target because<br />
of the limited number of final <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
plants), an average of 1,500 tanks and
THE ORIGINS 5<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns were being shipped to the<br />
battle front every thirty days. During<br />
the first ten months of 1944 the <strong>Army</strong><br />
Ordnance Directorate accepted 45,917<br />
trucks, but truck losses during the same<br />
period numbered 117,719. The German<br />
automotive industry had pushed the production<br />
of trucks up to an average of<br />
9,000 per month, but in September production<br />
began to drop off, a not too<br />
important recession in view of the looming<br />
motor fuel crisis.<br />
The German railway system had been<br />
under sporadic air attacks for years but<br />
w<strong>as</strong> still viable. Troops could be shuttled<br />
from one fighting front to another<br />
with only very moderate and occ<strong>as</strong>ional<br />
delays; raw materials and finished military<br />
goods had little w<strong>as</strong>te time in rail<br />
transport. In mid-August the weekly car<br />
loadings by the Reichsbahn hit a top<br />
figure of 899,091 cars.<br />
In September Hitler had no re<strong>as</strong>on<br />
to doubt, if he bot<strong>here</strong>d to contemplate<br />
the transport needed for a great counteroffensive,<br />
that the rich and flexible German<br />
railroad and canal complex would<br />
prove sufficient to the t<strong>as</strong>k ahead and<br />
could successfully resist even a co-ordinated<br />
and systematic air attack-<strong>as</strong> yet,<br />
of course, untried.<br />
In German war production the third<br />
quarter of 1944 witnessed an interesting<br />
conjuncture, one readily susceptible to<br />
misinterpretation by Hitler and Speer or<br />
by Allied airmen and intelligence. On<br />
the one hand German production w<strong>as</strong><br />
with e major exceptions of the oil<br />
and aircraft industries, at the peak output<br />
of the war; on the other hand the<br />
Allied air effort against the German<br />
means of war making w<strong>as</strong> approaching<br />
a peak in terms of tons of bombs and<br />
the number of planes which could be<br />
launched against the Third Reich. 2 But<br />
without the means of predicting what<br />
damage the Allied air effort could and<br />
would inflict if extrapolated three or<br />
six months into the future, and certainly<br />
without any advisers willing so to pre-<br />
dict, Hitler might re<strong>as</strong>on that German<br />
production and transport, if wisely<br />
husbanded and rigidly controlled, could<br />
support a major attack before the close<br />
of 1944. Indeed, only a fortnight prior<br />
to the briefing of 16 September Minister<br />
Speer had <strong>as</strong>sured Hitler that German<br />
war stocks could be expected to l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
through 1945. Similarly, in the head-<br />
quarters of the Western Allies it w<strong>as</strong><br />
e<strong>as</strong>y and natural to <strong>as</strong>sume the the<br />
thousands of tons of bombs dropped on<br />
Germany must inevitably have weakened<br />
the vital sections of the German war<br />
economy to a point w<strong>here</strong> collapse w<strong>as</strong><br />
imminent and likely to come before the<br />
end of 1944.<br />
Hitler’s optimism and miscalculation,<br />
then, resulted in the belief that Germany<br />
had the material means to launch and<br />
maintain a great counteroffensive, a<br />
belief nurtured by many of his trusted<br />
aides. Conversely, the miscalculation of<br />
the Western Allies <strong>as</strong> to the destruction<br />
2 The results of the numerous joint intelligence<br />
studies undertaken immediately after World War<br />
II on the relation between German production<br />
and the Allied air offensive are well summarized<br />
in the third volume of the official Air Forces<br />
series, Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Cate,<br />
eds., “The <strong>Army</strong> Air Forces in World War II,”<br />
vol. III, Europe: ARGUMENT to V-E Day, Jan-<br />
uary 1944 to May 1945 (Chicago: The University of<br />
Chicago Press. 1951). See also MS # P–059. Tank<br />
Losses (Generalmajor Burkhart Mueller-Hille-<br />
brand); K. O. Sauer, Effects of Aerial Warfare<br />
on German Armament Production (T.I. 341, M.I.F.<br />
3); United States Strategic Bombing Survey<br />
(<strong>US</strong>SBS), <strong>Military</strong> Analysis Division, The Impact<br />
<strong>Of</strong> the Allied Air Effort On German Logistics<br />
(W<strong>as</strong>hington, 1947).
6 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
wrought by their bombers contributed<br />
greatly to the perv<strong>as</strong>ive optimism which<br />
would make it difficult, if not impossible,<br />
for Allied commanders and intelligence<br />
agencies to believe or perceive that Ger-<br />
many still retained the material muscle<br />
for a mighty blow.<br />
Assuming that the Third Reich pos-<br />
sessed the material means for a quick<br />
transition from the defensive to the<br />
offensive, could Hitler and his entourage<br />
rely on the morale of the German nation<br />
and its fighting forces in this sixth year of<br />
the war? The five years which had<br />
elapsed since the inv<strong>as</strong>ion of Poland had<br />
taken heavy toll of the best physical<br />
specimens of the Reich. The irreplace-<br />
able loss in military manpower (the<br />
dead, missing, those demobilized because<br />
of disability or because of extreme family<br />
hardship) amounted to 3,266,686 men<br />
and 92,811 officers <strong>as</strong> of 1 September<br />
1944. 3 Even without an accurate me<strong>as</strong>ure<br />
of the cumulative losses suffered by the<br />
civilian population, or of the dwellings<br />
destroyed, it is evident that the German<br />
home front w<strong>as</strong> suffering directly and<br />
heavily from enemy action, despite the<br />
fact that the Americans and British were<br />
unable to get together on an air cam-<br />
paign designed to destroy the will of the<br />
German nation. Tre<strong>as</strong>on (<strong>as</strong> the Nazis<br />
saw it) had reared its ugly head in the<br />
abortive Putsch of July 1944, and the<br />
skeins of this plot against the person of<br />
the Fuehrer still were unraveling in the<br />
torture chambers of the Gestapo.<br />
3 German ground force losses are discussed in<br />
more detail in H. M. Cole, The Lorraine Campaign,<br />
United States <strong>Army</strong> in World War II (W<strong>as</strong>hington,<br />
1950), pp. 29–32. See also OKH, Gen. St. d. H/Organi-<br />
zations Abteilung (<strong>here</strong>after cited <strong>as</strong> OKH / Org. Abt.)<br />
KTB, 2 December 1944, which gives the revised<br />
personnel situation <strong>as</strong> of 1 November 1944.<br />
Had the Nazi Reich reached a point in<br />
its career like that which German history<br />
recorded in the collapse of the<br />
German Empire during the l<strong>as</strong>t months<br />
of the 1914–1918 struggle? Hitler,<br />
always prompt to parade his personal<br />
experiences <strong>as</strong> a Frontsoldat in the Great<br />
War and to quote this period of his life<br />
<strong>as</strong> testimony refuting opinions offered by<br />
his generals, w<strong>as</strong> keenly aware of the<br />
moral disintegration of the German<br />
people and the armies in 1918. Nazi<br />
propaganda had made the “stab in the<br />
back” (the theory that Germany had not<br />
been defeated in 1918 on the battlefield<br />
but had collapsed <strong>as</strong> a result of tre<strong>as</strong>on<br />
and weakness on the home front) an<br />
article of German faith, with the<br />
Fuehrer its leading proponent. Whatever<br />
soul-searching Hitler may have experienced<br />
privately <strong>as</strong> a result of the<br />
attempt on his life and the precipitate<br />
retreats of his armies, t<strong>here</strong> is no outward<br />
evidence that he saw in these<br />
events any kinship to those of 1918.<br />
He had great faith in the German<br />
people and in their devotion to himself<br />
<strong>as</strong> Leader, a faith both mystic and cynical.<br />
The noise of street demonstrations<br />
directed against himself or his regime<br />
had not once, during the years of war,<br />
<strong>as</strong>sailed his ears. German troops had won<br />
great victories in the p<strong>as</strong>t, why should<br />
they not triumph again? The great defeats<br />
had been, so Hitler’s intuition told<br />
him, the fruit of tre<strong>as</strong>on among high<br />
officers or, at the le<strong>as</strong>t, the result of insufficient<br />
devotion to National Socialism<br />
in the hearts and minds of the defeated<br />
commanders and the once powerful<br />
General Staff. The <strong>as</strong>s<strong>as</strong>sination attempt,<br />
<strong>as</strong> seen through Hitler’s own eyes, w<strong>as</strong><br />
proof positive that the suspicisions which<br />
he had long entertained vis-à-vis the
THE ORIGINS 7<br />
<strong>Army</strong> General Staff were correct. Now,<br />
he believed, this malignant growth could<br />
be cut away; exposure showed that it<br />
had no deep roots and had not contami-<br />
nated either the fighting troops or the<br />
rank and file of the German people.<br />
Despite the heavy losses suffered by the<br />
Wehrmacht in the p<strong>as</strong>t five years, Hitler<br />
w<strong>as</strong> certain that replacements could be<br />
found and new divisions created. His<br />
intuition told him that too many officers<br />
and men had gravitated into headquar-<br />
ters staffs, administrative and security<br />
services. He w<strong>as</strong> enraged by the growing<br />
disparity in the troop lists between<br />
“ration strength” and “combat strength”<br />
and, <strong>as</strong> a military dictator, expected that<br />
the issuance of threatening orders and<br />
the appointment of the brutal Heinrich<br />
Himmler <strong>as</strong> chief of the Replacement<br />
<strong>Army</strong> would eventually reverse this<br />
trend. At the beginning of September<br />
Hitler w<strong>as</strong> impatiently stamping the<br />
ground and waiting for the new battal-<br />
ions to spring forth. The months of July<br />
and August had produced eighteen new<br />
divisions, ten panzer brigades and nearly<br />
a hundred separate infantry battalions.<br />
Now twenty-five new divisions, about a<br />
thousand artillery pieces, and a score of<br />
general headquarters brigades of various<br />
types were demanded for delivery in<br />
October and November.<br />
How had Germany solved the man-<br />
power problem? From a population of<br />
some eighty million, in the Greater<br />
Reich, the Wehrmacht carried a total<br />
of 10,165,303 officers and men on its<br />
rosters at the beginning of September<br />
1944. What part of this total w<strong>as</strong> paper<br />
strength is impossible to say; certainly<br />
the personnel systems in the German<br />
armed forces had not been able to keep<br />
an accurate accounting of the tremen-<br />
dous losses suffered in the summer of<br />
1944. Nonetheless, this w<strong>as</strong> the strength<br />
figuratively paraded before Hitler by his<br />
adjutants. The number of units in the<br />
Wehrmacht order of battle w<strong>as</strong> impres-<br />
sive (despite such wholesale losses <strong>as</strong> the<br />
twenty-seven divisions engulfed during<br />
the Russian summer offensive against<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group <strong>Center</strong>). The collective<br />
German ground forces at the beginning<br />
of September 1944 numbered 327 divi-<br />
sions and brigades, of which 31 divisions<br />
and 13 brigades were armored. Again it<br />
must be noted that many of these units<br />
no longer in truth had the combat<br />
strength of either division or brigade<br />
(some had only their headquarters staff),<br />
but again, in Hitler’s eyes, this order of<br />
battle represented fighting units capa-<br />
ble of employment. Such contradiction<br />
<strong>as</strong> came from the generals commanding<br />
the paper-thin formations, some of whom<br />
privately regarded the once formidable<br />
Wehrmacht <strong>as</strong> a “paper tiger,” would be<br />
brushed angrily <strong>as</strong>ide <strong>as</strong> evidence of in-<br />
competence, defeatism–or tre<strong>as</strong>on.<br />
But the maintenance of this formid-<br />
able array of divisions and brigades re-<br />
flected the very real military potential<br />
of the Greater Reich, not yet fully ex-<br />
ploited even at the end of five years of<br />
what had been called total war. As in<br />
1915 the Germans had found that in a<br />
long conflict the hospitals provided a<br />
constant flow of replacements, and that<br />
this source could be utilized very effec-<br />
tively by the simple expedient of progres-<br />
sively lowering the physical standards<br />
required for front-line duty. In addition,<br />
each year brought a new cl<strong>as</strong>s to the<br />
colors <strong>as</strong> German youth matured. This<br />
source could be further exploited by<br />
lowering the age limit at one end of the<br />
conscription spectrum while incre<strong>as</strong>ing it
8 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
at the other. In 1944, for example, the<br />
age limit for “volunteers” for the ranks<br />
w<strong>as</strong> dropped to sixteen years and party<br />
pressure applied conducive to volun-<br />
teering. At the same time the older con-<br />
scription cl<strong>as</strong>ses were combed through<br />
and, in 1944, registration w<strong>as</strong> carried<br />
back to include males born in 1884.<br />
Another and extremely important<br />
manpower acquisition, made for the first<br />
time on any scale in the late summer of<br />
1944, came from the Navy and Air<br />
Force. Neither of these establishments<br />
remained in any position, at this stage<br />
of the war, to justify the relatively large<br />
numbers still carried on their rosters.<br />
While it is true that transferring air<br />
force ground crews to rifle companies<br />
would not change the numerical strength<br />
of the armed forces by jot or tittle, such<br />
practice would produce new infantry or<br />
armored divisions bearing new and, in<br />
most c<strong>as</strong>es, high numbers.<br />
In spite of party propaganda that the<br />
Third Reich w<strong>as</strong> full mobilized behind<br />
the Fuehrer and notwithstanding the<br />
constant and slavish mouthing of the<br />
phr<strong>as</strong>e “total war,” Germany had not,<br />
in five years of struggle, completely uti-<br />
lized its manpower-and equally impor-<br />
tant, womanpower-in prosecuting the<br />
war. 4 Approximately four million public<br />
servants and individuals deferred from<br />
military service for other re<strong>as</strong>ons consti-<br />
tuted a reserve <strong>as</strong> yet hardly touched.<br />
And, despite claims to the contrary, no<br />
thorough or rational scheme had been<br />
adopted to comb all able-bodied men<br />
out of the factories and from the fields<br />
4 B. H. Klein in his Germany’s Economic Prep-<br />
arations for War (Cambridge: Harvard University<br />
Press, 1959) advances the thesis that, contrary to<br />
Nazi propaganda, the Third Reich never went<br />
over to an all-out industrial and economic effort<br />
until the war w<strong>as</strong> lost.<br />
for service in uniform. In five years only<br />
a million German men and women had<br />
been mobilized for the labor force. In-<br />
deed, it may be concluded that the bulk<br />
of industrial and agrarian replacements<br />
for men drafted into the armed services<br />
w<strong>as</strong> supplied by some seven million<br />
foreign workers and prisoners of war<br />
slaving for the conqueror.<br />
Hitler hoped to lay his hands on those<br />
of his faithful followers who thus far had<br />
escaped the rigors of the soldier life by<br />
enfolding themselves in the uniform of<br />
the party functionary. The t<strong>as</strong>k of de-<br />
fining the nonessential and making the<br />
new order palatable w<strong>as</strong> given to Reich<br />
Minister Joseph Goebbels, who on 24<br />
August 1944 announced the new mobili-<br />
zation scheme: schools and theaters to be<br />
closed down, a 60-hour week to be intro-<br />
duced and holidays temporarily abol-<br />
ished, most types of publications to be<br />
suspended (with the notable exception<br />
of “standard political works,’’ Mein<br />
Kampf, for one), small shops of many<br />
types to be closed, the staffs of govern-<br />
mental bureaus to be denuded, and simi-<br />
lar belt tightening. By 1 September this<br />
dr<strong>as</strong>tic comb-out w<strong>as</strong> in full swing and<br />
accompanied within the uniformed<br />
forces by me<strong>as</strong>ures designed to reduce<br />
the headquarters staffs and shake loose<br />
the “rear area swine,” in the Fuehrer’s<br />
contemptuous phr<strong>as</strong>e. 5<br />
This new flow of manpower would<br />
give Hitler the comforting illusion of<br />
combat strength, an illusion risen from<br />
his indulgence in what may be identified<br />
to the American reader <strong>as</strong> “the numbers<br />
5 For a detailed description of the Goebbels<br />
comb-out see the manuscript study prepared by<br />
Charles V. P. von Luttichau entitled The Ardennes<br />
<strong>Of</strong>fensive, Germany’s Situation in the Fall of<br />
1944, Part II, The Economic Situation (1953).<br />
OCMH.
THE ORIGINS 9<br />
racket.” Dozens of German officers who<br />
at one time or another had re<strong>as</strong>on to<br />
observe the Fuehrer at work have com-<br />
mented on his obsession with numbers<br />
and his implicit faith in statistics no<br />
matter how murky the sources from<br />
which they came or how misleading<br />
when translated into fact. So Hitler had<br />
insisted on the creation of new forma-<br />
tions with new numbers attached t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
to, rather than bringing back to- full<br />
combat strength those units which had<br />
been bled white in battle. Thus the<br />
German order of battle distended in the<br />
autumn of 1944, bloated by new units<br />
while the strength of the German ground<br />
forces declined. In the same manner<br />
Hitler accepted the monthly production<br />
goals set for the armored vehicle pro-<br />
ducers by Speer’s staff <strong>as</strong> being identical<br />
with the number of tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns which in fact would reach the front<br />
lines. Bemused by numbers on paper and<br />
surrounded by a staff which had little or<br />
no combat experience and by now w<strong>as</strong><br />
perfectly housebroken–never introduc-<br />
ing unple<strong>as</strong>ant questions <strong>as</strong> to what these<br />
numbers really meant—Hitler still saw<br />
himself <strong>as</strong> the Feldherr, with the men<br />
and the tanks and the guns required to<br />
wrest the initiative from the encircling<br />
enemy.<br />
How the Plan W<strong>as</strong> Born<br />
The plan for the Ardennes counter-<br />
offensive w<strong>as</strong> born in the mind and will<br />
of Hitler the Feldherr. Its conception<br />
and growth from ovum are worthy of<br />
study by the historian and the student<br />
of the military art <strong>as</strong> a prime example<br />
of the role which may be played by the<br />
single man and the single mind in the<br />
conduct of modern war and the direction<br />
of an army numbered in the millions.<br />
Such w<strong>as</strong> the military, political, eco-<br />
nomic, and moral position of the Third<br />
Reich in the autumn of 1944 that a<br />
leader who lacked all of the facts and<br />
who by nature clung to a mystic confi-<br />
dence in his star might rationally con-<br />
clude that defeat could be postponed<br />
and perhaps even avoided by some de-<br />
cisive stroke. <strong>To</strong> this configuration of<br />
circumstances must be added Hitler’s<br />
implicit faith in his own military genius,<br />
a faith to all appearance unshaken by<br />
defeat and tre<strong>as</strong>on, a faith that accepted<br />
the possibility, even the probability, that<br />
the course of conflict might be reversed<br />
by a military stroke of genius.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong>, after all, a prototype in<br />
German history which showed how the<br />
genius and the will of the Feldherr<br />
might wrest victory from certain defeat.<br />
Behind the desk in Hitler’s study hung a<br />
portrait of Frederick the Great. This<br />
man, of all the great military leaders in<br />
world history, w<strong>as</strong> Hitler’s ideal. The<br />
axioms given by Frederick to his generals<br />
were on the tip of Hitler’s tongue, ever<br />
ready to refute the pessimist or general-<br />
ize away a sticky fact. When his generals<br />
protested the inability of soldier flesh<br />
and blood to meet further demands,<br />
Hitler simply referred to the harsh de-<br />
mands made of his grenadiers by Fred-<br />
erick. When the cruelties of the military<br />
punitive code were incre<strong>as</strong>ed to the<br />
point that even the stomachs of Prussian<br />
officers rebelled, Hitler paraded the<br />
brutal code of Frederick’s army before<br />
them. Even the oath taken by SS officer<br />
candidates w<strong>as</strong> b<strong>as</strong>ed on the Frederician<br />
oath to the flag.<br />
An omnivorous reader of military his-<br />
tory, Hitler w<strong>as</strong> fond of relating episodes<br />
t<strong>here</strong>from <strong>as</strong> evidence of his catholic
10 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
military knowledge or <strong>as</strong> footnotes prov-<br />
ing the soundness of a decision. In a very<br />
human way he selected those historical<br />
examples which seemed to support his<br />
own views. Napoleon, before the inva-<br />
sion of Russia, had forbidden any refer-<br />
ence to the ill-fated campaign of Charles<br />
XII of Sweden because “the circum-<br />
stances were altered.” Hitler in turn had<br />
brushed <strong>as</strong>ide the fate of both these<br />
predecessors, in planning his Russian<br />
campaign, because they had lacked tanks<br />
and planes. In 1944, however, Hitler’s<br />
mind turned to his example, Frederick<br />
II, and found encouragement and sup-<br />
port. Frederick, at the commencement<br />
of the Seven Years War, had faced<br />
superior forces converging on his king-<br />
dom from all points of the comp<strong>as</strong>s. At<br />
Rossbach and Leuthen he had taken<br />
great risk but had defeated armies twice<br />
the strength of his own. By defeating his<br />
enemies in detail, Frederick had been<br />
able to hang on until the great alliance<br />
formed against Prussia had split <strong>as</strong> the<br />
result of an unpredictable historical<br />
accident.<br />
Three things seemed crystal clear to<br />
Hitler <strong>as</strong> explanation for Frederick’s<br />
final victory over his great enemies:<br />
victory on the battlefield, and not defeat,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the necessary preliminary to success-<br />
ful diplomatic negotiations and a peace<br />
settlement; the enemy coalition had<br />
failed to present a solid front when<br />
single members had suffered defeat;<br />
finally, Prussia had held on until, <strong>as</strong><br />
Hitler paraphr<strong>as</strong>ed Frederick’s own<br />
words, “one of [the] damned enemies<br />
gets too tired to fight any more.” If<br />
Hitler needed moral support in his de-<br />
cision to prepare for the counteroffensive<br />
at a time when Germany still w<strong>as</strong> reeling<br />
from enemy blows, it is very probable<br />
that he found this in the experience and<br />
ultimate triumph of Frederick called the<br />
Great.<br />
Although the first announcement of<br />
the projected counteroffensive in the<br />
Ardennes w<strong>as</strong> made by Hitler in the<br />
meeting on 16 September, the idea had<br />
been forming for some weeks in the<br />
Fuehrer’s mind. Many of the details in<br />
this development can never be known.<br />
The initial thought processes were<br />
buried with Hitler; his closest <strong>as</strong>sociates<br />
soon followed him to the grave, leaving<br />
only the barest information. The gen-<br />
eral outlines of the manner in which<br />
the plan took form can be discerned,<br />
however, of course with a gap <strong>here</strong> and<br />
t<strong>here</strong> and a necessary slurring over ex-<br />
act dates. 6<br />
The first and very faint glimmerings<br />
of the idea that a counteroffensive must<br />
be launched in the west are found in a<br />
long tirade made by Hitler before Gen-<br />
eraloberst Alfred Jodl and a few other<br />
officers on 31 July 1944. At this moment<br />
Hitler’s eyes are fixed on the Western<br />
Front w<strong>here</strong> the Allies, held f<strong>as</strong>t for<br />
several weeks in the Normandy hedge-<br />
rows, have finally broken through the<br />
containing German forces in the neigh-<br />
borhood of Avranches. Still physically<br />
shaken by the bomb bl<strong>as</strong>t which so<br />
nearly had cut short his career, the<br />
Fuehrer raves and rambles, bo<strong>as</strong>ts,<br />
threatens, and complains. As he mean-<br />
ders through the “conference,” really a<br />
solo performance, one idea reappears<br />
6 Exact dating for the various ph<strong>as</strong>es of the<br />
Ardennes plan, <strong>as</strong> these evolved in Hitler’s mind,<br />
now is impossible. Magna E. Bauer h<strong>as</strong> attempted<br />
to develop a chronology in MS # R–9, The Idea<br />
for the German Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive, 1944. See<br />
also MSS # P–069 (Kreipe), and A-862 The Prep-<br />
arations for the German <strong>Of</strong>fensive in the<br />
Ardennes, September to 16 December 1944 (Maj.<br />
Percy E. Schramm).
THE ORIGINS 11<br />
again and again: the final decision must<br />
come in the west and if necessary the<br />
other fronts must suffer so that a con-<br />
centrated, major effort can be made<br />
t<strong>here</strong>. No definite plans can be made <strong>as</strong><br />
yet, says Hitler, but he himself will<br />
accept the responsibility for planning<br />
and for command; the latter he will<br />
exercise from a headquarters some place<br />
in the Black Forest or the Vosges. <strong>To</strong><br />
guarantee secrecy, nobody will be<br />
allowed to inform the Commander in<br />
Chief West or his staff of these far-<br />
reaching plans; the WFSt, that is, Jodl,<br />
must form a small operational staff to<br />
aid the Fuehrer by furnishing any<br />
needed data. 7<br />
Hitler’s arrogation to himself of all<br />
command and decision vis-à-vis some<br />
major and concerted effort in the west<br />
w<strong>as</strong> no more than an embittered re-<br />
statement, with the <strong>as</strong>s<strong>as</strong>sination attempt<br />
in mind, of a fact which had been<br />
stuffed down the throats of the General<br />
Staff and the famous field commanders<br />
since the first gross defeat in Russia and<br />
had been underlined in blood by the<br />
executions following the Putsch of 20<br />
July. The decision to give priority to<br />
the Western Front, if one can take<br />
Hitler at his own word and waive a<br />
possible emotional reaction to the sud-<br />
den Allied plunge through the German<br />
line at the b<strong>as</strong>e of the Cotentin penin-<br />
sula, is something new and worthy of<br />
notice.<br />
The strategic and operational prob-<br />
lem posed by a war in which Germany<br />
had to fight an enemy in the e<strong>as</strong>t while<br />
at the same time opposing an enemy in<br />
the west w<strong>as</strong> at le<strong>as</strong>t <strong>as</strong> old <strong>as</strong> the<br />
unification of Germany. The problem of<br />
7 The Wehrmachtfuehrungsstab, or WFSt, w<strong>as</strong><br />
the Armed Forces Operations Staff.<br />
a war on two fronts had been analyzed<br />
and solutions had been proposed by the<br />
great German military thinkers, among<br />
these Moltke the Elder, Schlieffen, and<br />
Ludendorff, whose written works, so<br />
Hitler bo<strong>as</strong>ted, were more familiar to<br />
him than to those of his entourage who<br />
wore the red stripe of the General Staff.<br />
Moltke and Schlieffen, traveling by<br />
the theoretical route, had arrived at the<br />
conclusion that Germany lacked the<br />
strength to conduct successful offensive<br />
operations simultaneously in the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
and west. Ludendorff (Hitler’s quondam<br />
colleague in the comic opera Beer Hall<br />
Putsch) had seen this theory put to the<br />
test and proven in the 1914–1918 war.<br />
Hitler had been forced to learn the<br />
same lesson the hard way in the summer<br />
of 1944.<br />
A fanatical believer in the Clause-<br />
witzian doctrine of the offensive <strong>as</strong> the<br />
purest and only decisive form of war,<br />
Hitler only had to decide whether his<br />
projected counteroffensive should be<br />
made in the e<strong>as</strong>t or the west. In con-<br />
tr<strong>as</strong>t to the situation that had existed in<br />
the German High Command of World<br />
War I, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no sharp cleavage<br />
between “E<strong>as</strong>terners” and “Westerners”<br />
with the two groups struggling to gain<br />
control of the <strong>Army</strong> High Command and<br />
so dictate a favored strategy. It is true<br />
that OKH (personified at this moment<br />
by Guderian) had direct responsibility<br />
for the war on the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front and<br />
quite naturally believed that victory or<br />
defeat would be decided t<strong>here</strong>. On the<br />
other hand, OKW, with its chiefs Keitel<br />
and Jodl close to the seat of power, saw<br />
the Western Front <strong>as</strong> the paramount<br />
theater of operations. Again, this w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
natural result of the direct responsibility<br />
<strong>as</strong>signed this headquarters for the con-
12 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
duct of all operations outside of the<br />
E<strong>as</strong>tern Front. Hitler, however, had<br />
long since ce<strong>as</strong>ed to be influenced by<br />
his generals save in very minor matters.<br />
Nor is t<strong>here</strong> any indication that Keitel<br />
or Jodl exercised any influence in turn-<br />
ing the Fuehrer’s attention to the west.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is no simple or single explana-<br />
tion for Hitler’s choice of the Western<br />
Front <strong>as</strong> the scene of the great German<br />
counterstroke. The problem w<strong>as</strong> com-<br />
plex; so were Hitler’s mental processes.<br />
Some part of his re<strong>as</strong>oning breaks<br />
through in his conferences, speeches,<br />
and orders, but much is left to be in-<br />
ferred.<br />
As early <strong>as</strong> 1939 Hitler had gone on<br />
record <strong>as</strong> to the absolute necessity of<br />
protecting the Ruhr industrial area, the<br />
heart of the entire war-making machine.<br />
In November 1943, on the heels of<br />
E<strong>as</strong>tern Front reverses and before the<br />
Western Allies had set foot in strength<br />
across the Channel, Hitler repeated his<br />
fears for the Ruhr, “. . . but now while<br />
the danger in the E<strong>as</strong>t remained it w<strong>as</strong><br />
outweighed by the threat from the West<br />
w<strong>here</strong> enemy success would strike im-<br />
mediately at the heart of the German<br />
war economy . . . .” 8 Even after the<br />
dis<strong>as</strong>trous impact of the 1944 Soviet<br />
summer offensive he clung to the belief<br />
that the Ruhr factories were more im-<br />
portant to Germany than the loss of<br />
territory in the e<strong>as</strong>t. He seems to have<br />
felt that the war production in Silesia<br />
w<strong>as</strong> far out of Soviet reach: in any c<strong>as</strong>e<br />
Silesia produced less than the Ruhr.<br />
Then too, in the summer and early<br />
autumn of 1944 the Allied air attacks<br />
8 The so-called Hitler Conferences from which<br />
Hitler’s earlier thinking is derived are found in<br />
whole or in fragments in Felix Gilbert, ed.,<br />
Hitler Directs His War (New York: Oxford Uni-<br />
versity Press, 1950).<br />
against the Ruhr had failed to deliver<br />
any succession of knockout blows, nor<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the very real vulnerability of this<br />
area yet apparent.<br />
Politically, if Hitler hoped to lead<br />
from strength and parlay a military<br />
victory into a diplomatic coup, the mono-<br />
lithic <strong>US</strong>SR w<strong>as</strong> a less susceptible object<br />
than the coalition of powers in the west.<br />
W<strong>here</strong><strong>as</strong> Nazi propagandists breathed<br />
hatred of the Soviet, the tone toward<br />
England and the United States more<br />
often w<strong>as</strong> that of contempt and derision,<br />
<strong>as</strong> befitted the “decadent democracies.”<br />
Hitler seems to have partaken of this<br />
view, and in any c<strong>as</strong>e he believed that<br />
the Allies might e<strong>as</strong>ily split <strong>as</strong>under if<br />
one of them w<strong>as</strong> jolted hard enough.<br />
The inability of the western leaders to<br />
hold their people together in the face<br />
of defeat w<strong>as</strong> an oft-expressed and car-<br />
dinal axiom of the German Fuehrer,<br />
despite the example of the United King-<br />
dom to the contrary.<br />
From one point of view the decision<br />
for the west w<strong>as</strong> the result of progressive<br />
elimination <strong>as</strong> to the other fronts. In<br />
no way could victory in Italy or Finland<br />
change the course of the war. Russia<br />
likewise offered no hope for any de-<br />
cisive victory with the forces which Ger-<br />
many might expect to gather in 1944.<br />
The campaigns in the e<strong>as</strong>t had finally<br />
convinced Hitler, or so it would appear,<br />
that the v<strong>as</strong>t distances in the e<strong>as</strong>t and<br />
the seemingly inexhaustible flow of<br />
Soviet divisions created a military prob-<br />
lem whose solution lay beyond the capa-<br />
bilities of the Third Reich <strong>as</strong> long <strong>as</strong><br />
the latter w<strong>as</strong> involved in a multifront<br />
war. <strong>To</strong> put it another way, what Ger-<br />
many now needed w<strong>as</strong> a quick victory<br />
capable of bearing immediate diplo-<br />
matic fruit, Between 22 June 1941 and
THE ORIGINS 13<br />
1 November 1942 the German armies<br />
in the <strong>US</strong>SR had swept up 5,150,000<br />
prisoners of war (setting <strong>as</strong>ide the Rus-<br />
sians killed or severely wounded) but<br />
still had failed to bore in deep enough<br />
to deliver a paralyzing blow. A quick<br />
and decisive success in the second half<br />
of 1944 against 555 Soviet units of divi-<br />
sion size w<strong>as</strong> out of the question, even<br />
though Hitler would rave about the<br />
“Russian bluff” and deride the estimates<br />
prepared by his Intelligence, Fremde<br />
Heere Ost.<br />
Still other factors were involved in<br />
Hitler’s decision. For one thing the<br />
Allied breakout in Normandy w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
more pressing danger to the Third<br />
Reich than the Soviet advance in the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. Intuitively, perhaps, Hitler fol-<br />
lowed Schlieffen in viewing an enemy<br />
on the Rhine <strong>as</strong> more dangerous than<br />
an enemy in E<strong>as</strong>t Prussia. If this w<strong>as</strong><br />
Hitler’s view, then the Allied d<strong>as</strong>h<br />
across France in the weeks following<br />
would give all the verification required.<br />
Whether at this particular time Hitler<br />
saw the German West Wall <strong>as</strong> the best<br />
available springboard for a counterof-<br />
fensive is uncertain. But it is quite clear<br />
that the possession of a seemingly solid<br />
b<strong>as</strong>e for such an operation figured<br />
largely in the ensuing development of<br />
a Western Front attack.<br />
After the announcement of the west<br />
<strong>as</strong> the crucial front, in the 31 July con-<br />
ference, Hitler seemingly turned his<br />
attention, plus such reserves <strong>as</strong> were<br />
available, to the e<strong>as</strong>t. Perhaps this w<strong>as</strong><br />
only a p<strong>as</strong>sing aberration, perhaps Hitler<br />
had been moved by choler in July and<br />
now w<strong>as</strong> in the grip of indecision. Events<br />
on both fronts, however, were moving<br />
so rapidly that a final decision would<br />
have to be made. The death of Gen-<br />
eralfeldmarschall Guenther von Kluge,<br />
Commander in Chief West, seems to<br />
have triggered the next step toward<br />
irrevocable commitment. Coincident<br />
with the appointment of Model to re-<br />
place the suicide, Hitler met with a few<br />
of his immediate staff on 19 August to<br />
consider the situation in France. During<br />
this conference he instructed Walter<br />
Buhle, chief of the <strong>Army</strong> Staff at OKW,<br />
and Speer, the minister in charge of<br />
military production and distribution, to<br />
prepare large allotments of men and<br />
materiel for shipment to the Western<br />
Front. At the same time Hitler informed<br />
the conferees that he proposed to take<br />
the initiative at the beginning of Novem-<br />
ber when the Allied air forces would be<br />
unable to fly. By 19 August, it would<br />
appear, Hitler had made up his mind:<br />
an attack would be made, it would be<br />
made on the Western Front, and the<br />
target date would be early November.<br />
The remaining days of August were a<br />
nightmare for the German divisions in<br />
the west and for the German field com-<br />
manders. Shattered into bits and pieces<br />
by the weight of Allied guns and armor,<br />
hunted and hounded along the roads by<br />
the unopposed Allied air forces, cap-<br />
tured and killed in droves, the German<br />
forces in France were thoroughly beaten.<br />
All requests for permission to withdraw<br />
to more defensible positions were re-<br />
jected in peremptory f<strong>as</strong>hion by Hitler’s<br />
headquarters, with the cold rejoinder<br />
“stand and hold” or “fight to the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
man.” In most c<strong>as</strong>es these orders were<br />
read on the run by the retreating divi-<br />
sions.<br />
At the beginning of September Gen-<br />
eralfeldmarschall Walter Model w<strong>as</strong><br />
“put in the big picture” by the Fuehrer.<br />
Hitler gave <strong>as</strong> his “intention” for the
14 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
future conduct of operations that the<br />
retreating German armies must hold<br />
forward of the West Wall, thus allowing<br />
time needed to repair these defenses.<br />
In general the holding position indi-<br />
cated by Hitler ran from the Dutch<br />
co<strong>as</strong>t, through northern Belgium, along<br />
the forward edge of the West Wall in<br />
the sector between Aachen and the<br />
Moselle River, then via the western<br />
borders of Alsace and Lorraine to some<br />
indefinite connection with the Swiss<br />
frontier. Here, for the first time on the<br />
Western Front, Hitler relaxed his seem-<br />
ingly pigheaded views on the unyielding<br />
defense and permitted, even enjoined,<br />
a withdrawal. This permission, however,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> given for a very definite purpose:<br />
to permit the reorganization of Ger-<br />
many’s defense at or forward of the<br />
West Wall, the outer limit of Greater<br />
Germany.<br />
Despite the debacle in France, Hitler<br />
professed himself <strong>as</strong> unworried and even<br />
sanguine. On the first day of September,<br />
Rundstedt w<strong>as</strong> recalled to the position<br />
of Commander in Chief West which he<br />
had been forced to relinquish at the end<br />
of June under Hitler’s snide solicitude<br />
for his “health.” The new commander<br />
w<strong>as</strong> told that the enemy in the west<br />
would shortly be brought to a halt by<br />
logistic failures (in this forec<strong>as</strong>t the<br />
Fuehrer’s intuition served him well) and<br />
that the giant steps being taken toward<br />
Germany were the work of isolated<br />
“armored spearheads” which had out-<br />
run the main Allied forces and now<br />
could be snipped off by local counter-<br />
attacks, w<strong>here</strong>upon the front would sta-<br />
bilize. Since the U. S. Third <strong>Army</strong> under<br />
Lt. Gen. George S. Patton, Jr., w<strong>as</strong><br />
advancing with its right flank open (con-<br />
tact with the U.S. Seventh <strong>Army</strong> driving<br />
north from the Mediterranean had not<br />
<strong>as</strong> yet been made), Hitler ordered<br />
Rundstedt to counterattack against this<br />
exposed flank and cut the advanced<br />
American armor by seizing Reims. For<br />
this unenviable t<strong>as</strong>k the Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, at the moment little more than<br />
an army headquarters and a few army<br />
troops, would be beefed up and handed<br />
over to the new commander in chief. 9<br />
The thrust to Reims w<strong>as</strong> not intended<br />
<strong>as</strong> the grand-scale effort to regain the<br />
initiative which by this time w<strong>as</strong> fully<br />
rooted in Hitler’s mind. The Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> to counterattack, that<br />
is, to be committed with limited forces<br />
for the attainment of a limited object.<br />
The scheme visualized for November,<br />
no matter how vague its shape in the<br />
first week of September, w<strong>as</strong> that of a<br />
counteroffensive, or a major commit-<br />
ment of men and materiel designed to<br />
wrest the initiative from the enemy in<br />
pursuance of a major strategic victory.<br />
The counterattack w<strong>as</strong> made, but not<br />
<strong>as</strong> planned and not toward Reims. The<br />
b<strong>as</strong>e for the proposed operation, west of<br />
the Moselle River, w<strong>as</strong> lost to the Amer-<br />
icans before the attack could be<br />
launched. A watered-down variant on<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t side of the Moselle w<strong>as</strong> set in<br />
motion on 18 September, with Luné-<br />
ville <strong>as</strong> the first objective; it degenerated<br />
into a series of small, piecemeal attacks<br />
of only momentary significance. 10 This,<br />
the single major effort to win time and<br />
space by counterattack and so give<br />
breathing space to the Reich and footing<br />
for a counteroffensive, must be written<br />
9 The background of the abortive Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> attack is described in Cole, The Lorraine<br />
Campaign, pp. 190–95.<br />
10 The story of this operation is told in Cole,<br />
The Lorraine Campaign, ch. V, p<strong>as</strong>sim.
THE ORIGINS 15<br />
off <strong>as</strong> a complete failure. Nonetheless,<br />
by the second week of September t<strong>here</strong><br />
were encouraging evidences all along the<br />
Western Front that the battered German<br />
troops were beginning to get a toehold<br />
<strong>here</strong> and t<strong>here</strong>, and that the enemy who<br />
had run so f<strong>as</strong>t and so far w<strong>as</strong> not holding<br />
the pace. Except for a handful of bunk-<br />
ers and pillboxes the battle front w<strong>as</strong><br />
in process of stabilizing forward of the<br />
West Wall. Meanwhile German efforts<br />
to reactivate and rearm these fortifica-<br />
tions were in full swing.<br />
Despite the somber and often despair-<br />
ing reports prepared by Model and his<br />
successor, Rundstedt, during late Au-<br />
gust and early September, Hitler and<br />
his intimate staff in the E<strong>as</strong>t Prussian<br />
headquarters continued to give thought<br />
to a decisive attack in the west. About<br />
6 September, Jodl gave the Fuehrer an<br />
evaluation of the situation inherited by<br />
Rundstedt. The t<strong>as</strong>k at hand w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
withdraw <strong>as</strong> many troops from the line<br />
<strong>as</strong> possible, refit and re-form units. On<br />
the scale required, this work could not<br />
be completed before the first day of<br />
November. Since he w<strong>as</strong> probably lis-<br />
tening to a clearer phr<strong>as</strong>ing of his own<br />
cloudy concept, Hitler agreed, but with<br />
the proviso that the battle front must<br />
be kept <strong>as</strong> far to the west <strong>as</strong> possible.<br />
The re<strong>as</strong>on, expressed apparently for<br />
the first time, w<strong>as</strong> that the Allied air<br />
effort had to be kept at a distance from<br />
the Rhine bridges or the consequences<br />
might be dis<strong>as</strong>trous. Did Hitler fear<br />
that fighter-bombers operating from<br />
fields in France or Belgium might leave<br />
the Rhine crossing complex stricken and<br />
incapable of supporting the line of com-<br />
munications to the armies then on the<br />
left bank of the Rhine? Or did he fore-<br />
see that the Rhine bridges would be<br />
systematically hammered in an effort to<br />
strangle the German bid for the initia-<br />
tive when the day for the counteroffen-<br />
sive came?<br />
As a target date, 1 November now<br />
seemed firm. Hitler had tossed it out in<br />
an off-the-cuff gesture; Jodl had evalu-<br />
ated it in terms of the military situation<br />
<strong>as</strong> seen in the remote Wolf’s Lair; and<br />
in his first report after <strong>as</strong>suming com-<br />
mand, Rundstedt unwittingly added his<br />
blessing by estimating that the West<br />
Wall defenses would be refurbished and<br />
manned sometime around 20 October.<br />
The Commander in Chief West, be it<br />
noted, w<strong>as</strong> not yet privy to any attack<br />
plans except those for the Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong>.<br />
Since Hitler w<strong>as</strong> convinced that his<br />
western armies would hold before or at<br />
the West Wall position, and by intuition<br />
or self-hypnosis he held to this convic-<br />
tion, the next step w<strong>as</strong> to am<strong>as</strong>s the<br />
forces needed to issue offensively from<br />
the West Wall b<strong>as</strong>e of operations. Dur-<br />
ing July and August eighteen new divi-<br />
sions had been organized, fifteen of<br />
which were sent to the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front,<br />
one to Norway, and only two to the<br />
Western Front. A further Hitler order<br />
on 2 September commanded the creation<br />
of an “operational reserve” numbering<br />
twenty-five new divisions. This order<br />
lay behind the comb-out program en-<br />
trusted to Goebbels and definitely w<strong>as</strong><br />
in preparation for a western counter-<br />
offensive. Early in August the Western<br />
Front had been given priority on tanks<br />
coming off the <strong>as</strong>sembly line; this now<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made a permanent proviso and<br />
extended to cover all new artillery and<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault gun production.<br />
Further additions to the contemplated<br />
reserve would have to come from other
16 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
theaters of war. On 4 September OKW<br />
ordered a general movement of artillery<br />
units in the Balkans back to the Western<br />
Front. The southe<strong>as</strong>tern theater now<br />
w<strong>as</strong> bereft of much of its early signifi-<br />
cance and the German forces t<strong>here</strong>in<br />
stood to lose most of their heavy equip-<br />
ment in the event of a Soviet drive into<br />
the Balkans. The northern theater like-<br />
wise w<strong>as</strong> a potential source of reinforce-<br />
ments, particularly following the defec-<br />
tion of Finland in early September and<br />
the collapse of a homogeneous front.<br />
These “side shows” could be levied upon<br />
for the western counteroffensive, and<br />
even the sore-beset German armies in<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t, or so Hitler re<strong>as</strong>oned, could<br />
contribute armored divisions to the west.<br />
But in the main, the plan still evolving<br />
within the closed confines of the Wolf’s<br />
Lair turned on the withdrawal and re-<br />
habilitation of units which had taken<br />
part in the battle for France. As a first<br />
step the SS panzer divisions in the west<br />
were ordered out of the line (13 Sep-<br />
tember) and turned over to a new army<br />
headquarters, that of the Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong>.<br />
Having nominated a headquarters to<br />
control the reconstitution of units spe-<br />
cifically named for participation in an<br />
attack to be made in the west, the logical<br />
next step in development of the plan<br />
came in Hitler’s announcement on 16<br />
September: the attack would be de-<br />
livered in the Ardennes and Antwerp<br />
would be the objective.<br />
Why the Ardennes? <strong>To</strong> answer this<br />
question in a simple and direct manner<br />
is merely to say that the Ardennes would<br />
be the scene of a great winter battle<br />
because the Fuehrer had placed his<br />
finger on a map and made a pronounce-<br />
ment. This simplified version w<strong>as</strong> agreed<br />
to in the months after the war by all<br />
of those major German military figures<br />
in Hitler’s entourage who survived the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t battles and the final Gotterdam-<br />
merung purges. It is possible, however,<br />
that Hitler had discussed the operational<br />
concept of a counteroffensive through the<br />
Ardennes with Jodl–and before the 16<br />
September edict. The relationship be-<br />
tween these two men h<strong>as</strong> bearing on the<br />
entire “prehistory” of the Ardennes<br />
campaign. It is analyzed by the head-<br />
quarters diary-keeper and historian,<br />
Maj. Percy E. Schramm, <strong>as</strong> follows:<br />
GENERAL JODL<br />
The function of Genobst Jodl in the<br />
Fuehrer’s headquarters consisted of pre-<br />
paring-on the general staff level-the de-<br />
cisions the Fuehrer made in his capacity of<br />
C-in-C of the Wehrmacht. Jodl also w<strong>as</strong><br />
responsible for their execution. But these<br />
were not his only duties. Whenever the<br />
Fuehrer conceived a new military plan it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> Jodl with whom the idea w<strong>as</strong> discussed
THE ORIGINS 17<br />
and closely examined. It w<strong>as</strong> again Jodl<br />
who obtained the information necessary to<br />
transmute a vague idea into a workable<br />
plan. It w<strong>as</strong> also he who raised objections<br />
and suggestions which had been voiced by<br />
the immediately subordinate commands.<br />
These facts were so little known to the out-<br />
side world that the public scarcely knew<br />
Jodl, and that within the Wehrmacht-<br />
even among those in leading positions-he<br />
w<strong>as</strong> mostly considered only <strong>as</strong> an executive<br />
tool, by some people even <strong>as</strong> too willing a<br />
tool. The view w<strong>as</strong> widely held that the<br />
Fuehrer did not accept any opinion other<br />
than his own. It w<strong>as</strong> not recognized that,<br />
although Hitler in the final analysis might<br />
only follow his own trend of thought, he<br />
acquired the inner <strong>as</strong>surance necessary for<br />
his actions by constantly discussing his in-<br />
tentions within the confines of his inner<br />
circle. For this re<strong>as</strong>on, the Chief of the<br />
Wehrmacht Operations Staff (Jodl) w<strong>as</strong><br />
an extremely important figure in all stra-<br />
tegic decisions. . . . In his relationship to<br />
the Fuehrer, his functions were not merely<br />
executive, but involved a very complex<br />
process of giving and taking, altering and<br />
retrenching, warning and stimulating. 11<br />
The evidence is clear that Jodl and<br />
a few of his juniors from the Wehrmacht<br />
Operations Staff did examine the<br />
Ardennes concept very closely in the<br />
period from 25 September, when Hitler<br />
gave the first order to start detailed<br />
planning, to 11 October, when Jodl<br />
submitted the initial operations plan.<br />
Other but less certain evidence indicates<br />
that those present in the select confer-<br />
ence on 16 September were taken by<br />
surprise when Hitler made his announce-<br />
ment. Jodl definitely <strong>as</strong>cribes the selec-<br />
tion of the Ardennes to Hitler and Hitler<br />
alone, but at the time Jodl expressed<br />
this view he w<strong>as</strong> about to be tried before<br />
an international tribunal on the charge<br />
of preparing aggressive war. Even so,<br />
11 MS # B–034, OKW War Diary, 1 April–18<br />
December 1944: The West (Schramm).<br />
the “argument from silence,”—the fact<br />
that t<strong>here</strong> is no evidence of other<br />
thought on the Ardennes <strong>as</strong> the point<br />
of concentration prior to Hitler’s state-<br />
ment on 16 September—h<strong>as</strong> some valid-<br />
ity.<br />
The most impressive argument for<br />
<strong>as</strong>cribing sole authorship of the Arden-<br />
nes idea to Hitler is found in the simple<br />
fact that every major military decision<br />
in the German High Command for<br />
months p<strong>as</strong>t had been made by the<br />
Fuehrer, and that these Hitler decisions<br />
were made in detail, never in principle<br />
alone.<br />
The major re<strong>as</strong>ons for Hitler’s selec-<br />
tion of the Ardennes were stated by<br />
himself, although never in a single tabu-<br />
lation on a single occ<strong>as</strong>ion nor with any<br />
ordering of importance:<br />
The enemy front in the Ardennes sector<br />
w<strong>as</strong> very thinly manned.<br />
A blow <strong>here</strong> would strike the seam be-<br />
tween the British and Americans and lead<br />
to political <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> military disharmony<br />
between the Allies. Furthermore an en-<br />
trance along this seam would isolate the<br />
British 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group and allow the en-<br />
circlement and destruction of the British<br />
and Canadians before the American leader-<br />
ship (particularly the political leadership)<br />
could react.<br />
The distance from the jump-off line to a<br />
solid strategic objective (Antwerp) w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
too great and could be covered quickly,<br />
even in bad weather.<br />
The configuration of the Ardennes area<br />
w<strong>as</strong> such that the ground for maneuver w<strong>as</strong><br />
limited and so would require the use of<br />
relatively few divisions.<br />
The terrain to the e<strong>as</strong>t of the break-<br />
through sector selected w<strong>as</strong> very heavily<br />
wooded and offered cover against Allied air<br />
observation and attack during the build-up<br />
for the <strong>as</strong>sault.<br />
An attack to regain the initiative in this<br />
particular area would er<strong>as</strong>e the enemy<br />
ground threat to the Ruhr.
18<br />
Although Hitler never referred di-<br />
rectly to the lightning thrust made in<br />
1940 through the Ardennes <strong>as</strong> being in<br />
any sense a prototype for the operation<br />
in the same area four and a half years<br />
later, t<strong>here</strong> is indication of a more than<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ual connection between the two cam-<br />
paigns in Hitler’s own thinking. For<br />
example, during the 16 September ex-<br />
posé he set the attainment of “another<br />
Dunkirk” <strong>as</strong> his goal. Then, <strong>as</strong> detailed<br />
planning began, Hitler turned again<br />
and again to make operational proposals<br />
which had more than chance similarity<br />
to those he had made before the 1940<br />
offensive. When, in September 1939,<br />
Hitler had announced his intention to<br />
attack in the west, the top-ranking offi-<br />
cers of the German armed forces had to<br />
a man shown their disfavor for this<br />
daring concept. Despite this opposition<br />
Hitler had gone ahead and personally<br />
selected the general area for the initial<br />
penetration, although perhaps with con-<br />
siderable stimulation from Generalfeld-<br />
marschall Fritz Erich von Manstein. The<br />
lightning campaign through the Nether-<br />
lands, Belgium, and France had been<br />
the first great victory won by Hitler’s<br />
intuition and the Fuehrerprinzip over<br />
the German General Staff, establishing<br />
a trend which had led almost inevitably<br />
to the virtual dictatorship in military<br />
command exercised by the Fuehrer in<br />
1944. Also, the contempt for Allied gen-<br />
eralship which Hitler continually ex-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
pressed can be regarded <strong>as</strong> more than<br />
bomb<strong>as</strong>t. He would be prone to believe<br />
that the Western Allies had learned<br />
nothing from the experience of 1940,<br />
that the conservative military tradition<br />
which had deemed the Ardennes <strong>as</strong><br />
impossible for armor w<strong>as</strong> still in the<br />
saddle, and that what German arms had<br />
accomplished in 1940 might be their<br />
portion a second time. Two of the fac-<br />
tors which had entered into the plans<br />
for the 1940 offensive still obtained: a<br />
very thin enemy line and the need for<br />
protecting the Ruhr. The German<br />
attack could no longer be supported by<br />
an air force which outweighed the op-<br />
position, but this would be true wher-<br />
ever the attack w<strong>as</strong> delivered. Weather<br />
had favored movement through the<br />
Ardennes defiles in the spring of 1940.<br />
This could hardly be expected in the<br />
month of November, but t<strong>here</strong> is no<br />
indication that Hitler gave any thought<br />
to the relation of weather and terrain<br />
<strong>as</strong> this might affect ground operations<br />
in the Ardennes. He tended to look at<br />
the sky rather than the ground, <strong>as</strong> the<br />
Luftwaffe deteriorated, and bad weath-<br />
er-bad flying weather–w<strong>as</strong> his desire.<br />
In sum, Hitler’s selection of the Arden-<br />
nes may have been motivated in large<br />
part by the hope that the clock could<br />
be turned back to the glorious days of<br />
1940. 12<br />
12 General Heinz Guderian, Panzer Leader (New<br />
York: E. P. Dutton & Co., Inc., 1952, app. 3.
CHAPTER II<br />
Planning the Counteroffensive<br />
Details of the Plan<br />
About 25 September Jodl w<strong>as</strong> ordered<br />
to begin a detailed analysis of the Hit-<br />
lerian concept, the only function now<br />
left to the great General Staff. Some<br />
latitude remained to the individual staff<br />
officers and those favored few in the high<br />
echelon of command who retained ac-<br />
cess to the Fuehrer in kneading and<br />
shaping the very general outline handed<br />
down by Hitler into an operations plan.<br />
The outline <strong>as</strong> it now had taken shape<br />
contained these major points: (a) the<br />
attack should be launched sometime<br />
between 20 and 30 November; (b) it<br />
should be made through the Ardennes<br />
in the Monschau-Echternach sector; (c)<br />
the initial object would be the seizure<br />
of bridgeheads over the Meuse River<br />
between Liege and Namur; (d) t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
after, Antwerp would be the objective; 1<br />
(e) a battle to annihilate the British<br />
1 The precise re<strong>as</strong>ons for the selection of<br />
Antwerp <strong>as</strong> the German objective are none too<br />
clear. The city represented the main supply b<strong>as</strong>e<br />
for British operations and it might be expected<br />
that the British public would react adversely to<br />
an Allied command responsible for the loss of an<br />
area so close to England which could be em-<br />
ployed for V–2 attacks at short range. Later, at<br />
Nuremberg Rundstedt would say that the Meuse<br />
bridgeheads and Liege actually were the ultimate<br />
objectives. The Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> commander,<br />
General der Panzertruppen H<strong>as</strong>so-Eccard von<br />
Manteuffel. gives his story in Seymour Freiden<br />
and William Richardson, eds., The Fatal De-<br />
cisions (New York: William Sloane Associates,<br />
Inc., 1956). Part 6.<br />
and Canadians would ultimately be<br />
fought north of the line Antwerp-Liege-<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne; (f) a minimum of thirty divi-<br />
sions would be available, ten of which<br />
would be armored; (g) support would<br />
be given by an unprecedented concentra-<br />
tion of artillery and rocket projector<br />
units; (h) operational control would be<br />
vested in four armies-two panzer armies<br />
abre<strong>as</strong>t in the lead, two armies com-<br />
posed largely of infantry divisions to<br />
cover the flanks; (i) the Luftwaffe would<br />
be prepared to support the operation;<br />
(j) all planning would aim at securing<br />
tactical surprise and speed; (k) secrecy<br />
would be maintained at all costs and<br />
only a very limited number of individ-<br />
uals would be made privy to the plan.<br />
(Map I)<br />
Theoretically, the chief of OKW,<br />
Keitel, should have been the central<br />
figure <strong>as</strong> preparations for the Ardennes<br />
counteroffensive unrolled. Actually he<br />
w<strong>as</strong> charged with estimating the fuel<br />
and ammunition required. 2 Jodl and the<br />
Armed Forces Operations Staff would<br />
m<strong>as</strong>termind the great attack. Rundstedt,<br />
Commander in Chief West, w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
informed of the impending operation;<br />
indeed at this stage he did not even<br />
know that Hitler envisaged a counter-<br />
offensive in the west. So much for the<br />
2 The remaining records of the German High<br />
Command show clearly that Keitel no longer had<br />
a hand in the actual direction of the war or in<br />
strategic planning.
20 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
“Rundstedt <strong>Of</strong>fensive,” <strong>as</strong> this appella-<br />
tion w<strong>as</strong> broadc<strong>as</strong>t to the world by the<br />
Allies in December 1944.<br />
The mechanics of German staff work<br />
seem to have deteriorated little during<br />
the years of war despite the disfavor<br />
into which the General Staff, <strong>as</strong> an insti-<br />
tution, had fallen. Methodically, accord-<br />
ing to doctrine <strong>as</strong> old <strong>as</strong> Moltke the<br />
Elder, the young officers with Jodl<br />
studied variants to the scheme proposed<br />
by Hitler. Ultimately the staff settled<br />
on five possible courses of action:<br />
Operation Holland: a single-thrust at-<br />
tack to be launched from the Venlo area,<br />
with Antwerp <strong>as</strong> the objective.<br />
Operation Liège-Aachen: a two-pronged<br />
attack with the main effort driving from<br />
northern Luxembourg in a northwesterly<br />
direction, subsequently turning due north<br />
to meet the secondary attack which would<br />
be launched from the sector northwest of<br />
Aachen.<br />
Operation Luxembourg: a two-pronged<br />
attack launched simultaneously from cen-<br />
tral Luxembourg and Metz to seize Longwy.<br />
Operation Lorraine: also a double en-<br />
velopment, to be launched from Metz and<br />
Baccarat and to converge on Nancy.<br />
Operation Alsace: an envelopment to be<br />
executed in two thrusts, one originating<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Epinal and the other e<strong>as</strong>t of Mont-<br />
béliard, the juncture to be made in the<br />
Vesoul area.<br />
<strong>Of</strong> these five possibilities the plan-<br />
ning staff recommended the first two.<br />
Operation Holland w<strong>as</strong> recognized <strong>as</strong><br />
risky but, at the same time, the<br />
most promising strategically. Operation<br />
Liège-Aachen w<strong>as</strong> deemed a good ex-<br />
ercise of the forward double envelop-<br />
ment and the possible payoff very large<br />
–the destruction of the enemy in the<br />
Aachen salient. In conversation with<br />
Jodl on 9 October, Hitler plumped for<br />
a two-pronged envelopment, setting in<br />
chain what would become a bitter con-<br />
troversy between his views and those of<br />
his major field commanders. When, two<br />
days later, Jodl produced a draft plan<br />
and operation overlay for Hitler’s in-<br />
spection, the favored solution seems to<br />
have been contained in Operation Liège-<br />
Aachen with emph<strong>as</strong>is on a main effort<br />
to be made through the Ardennes and<br />
Eifel. As Schramm soberly puts it: “Sys-<br />
tematic re-examination confirmed that<br />
the area selected by the Fuehrer actually<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the most promising on the whole<br />
Western Front.”<br />
The scoffer may feel that such a solu-<br />
tion by junior officers w<strong>as</strong> predestined.<br />
And, although the planning staffs in<br />
1940 had been able to introduce radical<br />
changes into the Hitler scheme of ma-<br />
neuver, perhaps such independent staff<br />
operation no longer w<strong>as</strong> possible, or at<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t politic. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no high-placed<br />
and unbi<strong>as</strong>ed professional testimony,<br />
however, to negate this decision by the<br />
colonels and lieutenant colonels who<br />
vetted the Hitler concept. Rundstedt,<br />
despite a deep-burning personal desire<br />
to detach his name from the final offen-<br />
sive and a professional contempt for the<br />
failure to recognize the paucity of means<br />
for the mission <strong>as</strong>signed him, would<br />
later say of the Ardennes Campaign and<br />
Hitler’s share in its formulation: “The<br />
operational idea <strong>as</strong> such can almost be<br />
called a stroke of genius.”<br />
Hitler now accepted both of the rec-<br />
ommended solutions and ordered prep-<br />
aration of a new draft synthesizing the<br />
two. This concept of a double envelop-<br />
ment with the two prongs of the attack<br />
originating far apart and c<strong>as</strong>ting a wide<br />
net <strong>as</strong> they moved to a meeting would<br />
be known to the German staffs <strong>as</strong> the<br />
“Grand Slam” (the American command-
PLANNING THE COUNTEROFFENSIVE 21<br />
ers were not the only military bridge<br />
players) or the “Big Solution.” Although<br />
Jodl and the WFSt often were charged<br />
by subordinate headquarters <strong>as</strong> having<br />
no realization of the difficulties under<br />
which the outnumbered German troops<br />
were battling, <strong>here</strong> appears to be one<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e in which the planning staff w<strong>as</strong><br />
thoroughly aware that the means were<br />
not and could not be adequate to the<br />
grandiose object of the Big Solution.<br />
Without the support of the field com-<br />
manders, <strong>as</strong> yet not involved in the<br />
planning, Jodl dared not, or at le<strong>as</strong>t pre-<br />
ferred not, to gainsay the Fuehrer’s pro-<br />
posal. The argument at this point w<strong>as</strong><br />
on the location of the southern boundary<br />
of the main attack force. Hitler held<br />
for the line W<strong>as</strong>serbillig, Arlon, and<br />
the north bank of the Semois River. The<br />
staff proposal w<strong>as</strong> more modest in the<br />
area <strong>as</strong>signed the attack, the southern<br />
boundary originating near Diekirch,<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sing north of Martelange to Neufchâ-<br />
teau, thence turning northwest to Givet.<br />
Ten days after the initial staff pre-<br />
sentation Jodl w<strong>as</strong> back to hand Hitler<br />
the revised outline plan or Aufmarschan-<br />
weisung. The Aufmarschanweisung, in<br />
German practice, w<strong>as</strong> a directive con-<br />
taining the b<strong>as</strong>ic parts of the plan, the<br />
guiding principles to be followed in<br />
developing and implementing the plan,<br />
and general instructions <strong>as</strong> to procedure.<br />
From this, more detailed planning nor-<br />
mally w<strong>as</strong> undertaken by the headquar-<br />
ters <strong>as</strong>signed to carry out the operation.<br />
Even before Hitler gave the final nod,<br />
the chiefs of staff of the two major field<br />
commands concerned (<strong>as</strong> yet unaware<br />
that a counteroffensive w<strong>as</strong> in the offing)<br />
were called to the E<strong>as</strong>t Prussian head-<br />
quarters. General der Kavellerie Sieg-<br />
fried Westphal, from OB West, and<br />
General der Infanterie Hans Krebs,<br />
chief of Model’s <strong>Army</strong> Group B staff,<br />
reported at the Wolf’s Lair on the<br />
morning of 22 October. 3 They hardly<br />
could have expected a ple<strong>as</strong>ant recep-<br />
tion: the embattled city of Aachen had<br />
fallen to the Americans, and they had<br />
the unple<strong>as</strong>ant t<strong>as</strong>k of pressing OKW<br />
for a favorable answer to Rundstedt’s<br />
repeated-and unanswered-requests for<br />
more divisions to prevent an Allied<br />
breakthrough to the Ruhr.<br />
Scarcely had salutes been exchanged<br />
when the two generals were <strong>as</strong>ked to<br />
sign a pledge binding them to secrecy<br />
in regard to a mysterious operation<br />
Wacht am Rhein (Watch on the Rhine).<br />
If this plan should leak out they would<br />
be shot! Westphal and Krebs were in<br />
the toils of a security system <strong>as</strong> care-<br />
fully conceived and executed <strong>as</strong> the com-<br />
bined vigilance of the armed forces and<br />
the Gestapo could make it. Wacht am<br />
Rhein w<strong>as</strong> a cover name, chosen to give<br />
the impression that the plan w<strong>as</strong> for a<br />
defense at the Rhine. An alternate and<br />
more commonly used formula, the<br />
Abwehrschlacht im Westen (Defensive<br />
Battle in the West) had the same intent<br />
and the added advantage that it had<br />
been used to describe the battles<br />
around Aachen.<br />
Probably the two generals were greatly<br />
heartened—and surprised—when they<br />
were handed a long list of troops sched-<br />
uled to arrive on the Western Front at<br />
the end of November and in early<br />
December. At noon, for the first time,<br />
they reported to Hitler who w<strong>as</strong> holding<br />
3 The German term Oberbefehlshaber West,<br />
which may mean either the Commander in Chief<br />
West or his headquarters, h<strong>as</strong> been rendered <strong>as</strong><br />
OB WEST when it refers to the headquarters and<br />
<strong>as</strong> C-in-C West when it refers to the person.
22 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
his daily conference. When the confer-<br />
ence w<strong>as</strong> finished, Westphal and Krebs<br />
found themselves in a second and much<br />
smaller meeting, with Hitler himself<br />
conducting the briefing on an <strong>as</strong>tound-<br />
ing plan for a counteroffensive to be<br />
undertaken in the <strong>Army</strong> Group B area.<br />
This attack, said Hitler, w<strong>as</strong> designed<br />
to surround and destroy the British and<br />
American forces north of the line B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne-Brussels-Antwerp. It would be<br />
carried out in two ph<strong>as</strong>es: the first ph<strong>as</strong>e<br />
to close the attacking force along the<br />
Meuse River and seize bridgeheads; the<br />
second ph<strong>as</strong>e to culminate in the cap-<br />
ture of Antwerp. (Neither <strong>here</strong> nor<br />
later is t<strong>here</strong> evidence of any detailed<br />
planning <strong>as</strong> to what should be done once<br />
Antwerp fell.) <strong>Army</strong> Group B would<br />
have three armies for the attack: the<br />
Fifth and Sixth Panzer Armies would<br />
be in the van; the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> would<br />
be echeloned to the rear so <strong>as</strong> to cover<br />
the exposed southern flank of the attack<br />
wedge. Two target dates were fixed, 20<br />
November for the end of all prepara-<br />
tions, 25 November for the beginning<br />
of the offensive. The latter date had<br />
been selected by Dr. Schuster and his<br />
meteorologists in answer to the Fuehrer’s<br />
demand for a period in which at le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
ten days of continuous bad weather and<br />
poor visibility might be expected. Such<br />
a stretch of poor flying weather would<br />
ground the superior Allied air forces.<br />
Furthermore, the target date coincided<br />
with the new moon, a help in reducing<br />
the effectiveness of Allied night raids.<br />
Westphal and Krebs then heard that<br />
they could count on 18 infantry and 12<br />
armored or mechanized divisions “for<br />
planning purposes.” This windfall of<br />
reinforcements included 13 infantry<br />
divisions, 2 parachute divisions, and 6<br />
panzer-type divisions from the OKW<br />
strategic reserve. But 3 infantry and 6<br />
panzer divisions would have to be with-<br />
drawn by OB WEST from the already<br />
weakened Western Front and re-formed<br />
before taking their place in the coming<br />
offensive. (This w<strong>as</strong> hardly ple<strong>as</strong>ant<br />
news since OB WEST possessed only 9<br />
panzer divisions in its entire theater of<br />
operations.) Hitler then recapitulated<br />
the additional reinforcements which had<br />
been listed in the morning: 5 motorized<br />
antiaircraft (flak) regiments from the<br />
Luftwaffe, 12 Volks artillery corps, 10<br />
rocket projector (Werfer) brigades, plus<br />
a host of army troops.<br />
It may be that Hitler sensed some<br />
skepticism on the part of the two visi-<br />
tors, and it is probable that he remem-<br />
bered p<strong>as</strong>t promises of reinforcements<br />
which had never arrived; whatever the<br />
re<strong>as</strong>on, he added his personal <strong>as</strong>surance<br />
that these units would be forthcoming.<br />
Further, he gave his pledge that the<br />
Luftwaffe would support the operation<br />
with up to fifteen hundred fighters, of<br />
which a hundred would be the new jet<br />
planes, far superior to anything the<br />
Allies could put in the air. As a clincher,<br />
Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel<br />
then gave his word <strong>as</strong> an officer that<br />
17,000 cubic meters (4,250,000 gallons)<br />
of motor fuel would be available for the<br />
attack, plus a special fifty-trainload am-<br />
munition reserve, all this in excess of<br />
current consumption. The two silent<br />
generals were dismissed with the injunc-<br />
tion that OB WEST must hold its front,<br />
even at the cost of giving ground, with-<br />
out committing a single one of the for-<br />
mations earmarked for Wacht am Rhein,<br />
and told that OB WEST should submit<br />
a draft plan for the first ph<strong>as</strong>e of the<br />
attack forthwith.
PLANNING THE COUNTEROFFENSIVE 23<br />
Back at the Ziegenberg headquarters<br />
of OB WEST, Westphal recited the in-<br />
structions he had received, then h<strong>as</strong>tened<br />
on to give Rundstedt his own appraisal<br />
of the plan and the “politics” involved.<br />
The plan to seize Antwerp w<strong>as</strong> far too<br />
ambitious for the forces available: the<br />
time for preparation w<strong>as</strong> far too short.<br />
Since it w<strong>as</strong> apparent that the whole<br />
scheme w<strong>as</strong> inspired by Hitler, OB<br />
WEST probably would have no voice in<br />
determining plans or in directing the<br />
operation unless it could team up with<br />
Jodl who, in Westphal’s opinion, w<strong>as</strong><br />
FIELD MARSL VON RUNDSTEDT<br />
wary of the Big Solution proposed by<br />
Hitler.<br />
Rundstedt had to act quickly if OB<br />
WEST w<strong>as</strong> to make its views known.<br />
With the penalty for a security failure<br />
so immediate, only the operations officer,<br />
Generalleutnant Bodo Zimmermann, the<br />
chief of Supply and Administration,<br />
Generalleutnant Friedrich John, and one<br />
aide were let in on the secret. The next<br />
step w<strong>as</strong> to call a conference for 27<br />
October (it now w<strong>as</strong> late on the 24th)<br />
at the <strong>Army</strong> Group B headquarters near<br />
Krefeld. In the three nights and two days<br />
remaining, the little group at OB WEST<br />
would prepare an operations plan; to<br />
this the code name Martin w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed.<br />
The part played by Rundstedt dur-<br />
ing the prelude to the Ardennes Cam-<br />
paign and in its denoument needs some<br />
explanation. An aloof, nonpolitical of-<br />
ficer of the old Prussian school, Rund-<br />
stedt by re<strong>as</strong>on of age and prestige stood<br />
at the apex of the German officer c<strong>as</strong>te<br />
system. He had survived Hitler’s dis-<br />
favor, incurred during his first tour <strong>as</strong><br />
Commander in Chief West, then had<br />
been brought back from semiretirement<br />
to take over his old post at a time when<br />
the German armies in the west were<br />
everyw<strong>here</strong> in retreat. Rundstedt’s posi-<br />
tion in the autumn of 1944 w<strong>as</strong> exceed-<br />
ingly difficult. He w<strong>as</strong> treated correctly<br />
by Hitler, Keitel, Jodl, and the others in<br />
the OKW, but w<strong>as</strong> regarded <strong>as</strong> too old<br />
and too lukewarm toward National<br />
Socialism to merit anything more than<br />
the outer forms of respect. Advice from<br />
Rundstedt w<strong>as</strong> consistently pigeonholed<br />
by Jodl or brushed <strong>as</strong>ide by Hitler, ex-<br />
cept in those rare c<strong>as</strong>es when Jodl found<br />
it expedient to quote Rundstedt, the<br />
field commander, in support of a posi-<br />
tion being developed by the WFSt.<br />
The relations between Rundstedt and<br />
his chief subordinate, Model, comman-<br />
der of <strong>Army</strong> Group B, were correct but
24 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
not cordial. After the suicide of Kluge,<br />
both the supreme ground command in<br />
the west, OB WEST, and that of <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group B had been united on Model’s<br />
shoulders. Rundstedt’s return to the<br />
Western Front ostensibly w<strong>as</strong> ordered to<br />
relieve this untenable command situa-<br />
tion. However, Hitler and his advisers<br />
intended to keep the old field marshal<br />
officially in leading strings. Model w<strong>as</strong><br />
well aware of the limitations imposed on<br />
Rundstedt. He himself w<strong>as</strong> an ardent<br />
Nazi, clever, ambitious, and much<br />
younger than Rundstedt. Thus far Mo-<br />
del had retained a high place in the<br />
Fuehrer’s notoriously fickle favor. The<br />
upshot seems to have been a kind of<br />
truce between Rundstedt and Model in<br />
which the younger field marshal de-<br />
ferred to the elder, but in which the OB<br />
WEST commander kept his place by<br />
handling two-way communications be-<br />
tween his subordinate headquarters,<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group B, and his superior head-<br />
quarters, OKW, without overly much<br />
interference or comment. Under such<br />
strained circumstances OB WEST would<br />
more and more <strong>as</strong>sume the properties of<br />
a rubber stamp, this becoming most ap-<br />
parent during the actual operations in<br />
the Ardennes. 4<br />
Whether or not Rundstedt’s views<br />
would get an airing before Hitler, the<br />
same sense of duty which compelled the<br />
aging field marshal to remain in his<br />
anomalous post also forced him to an<br />
official expression of his military opin-<br />
4 The relations between Rundstedt and Model<br />
are described by one of the latter’s staff officers,<br />
Thuisko von Metzch, in an unpublished report<br />
made for the <strong>Of</strong>fice of the Chief of <strong>Military</strong><br />
<strong>History</strong> in 1952. Charles V. P. von Luttichau,<br />
Report on the Interview With Mr. Thuisko von<br />
Metzsch [14–19 March 1952] on Operations of<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group B and Its Role in the German<br />
Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive, 1944. Copy in OCMH.<br />
FIELD MARSHAL MODEL<br />
ion. Sometime around 21 September<br />
Rundstedt had advised OKW that the<br />
ultimate objective for all strategy in the<br />
west should be a counteroffensive to in-<br />
flict a decisive defeat on the enemy. The<br />
hope of such a strategy seems to have<br />
evaporated in the smoke and dust of the<br />
Aachen battle; by mid-October Rund-<br />
stedt had a single thought, simply to hold<br />
on. It may be that momentarily Rund-<br />
stedt w<strong>as</strong> fired by the plans which his<br />
chief of staff brought back from the<br />
Wolf’s Lair, but the field marshal w<strong>as</strong><br />
too old and too experienced to expect<br />
miracles. Although Rundstedt had rec-<br />
ognized the merit of Hitler’s opera-<br />
tional plan, from the very first he
PLANNING THE COUNTEROFFENSIVE 25<br />
realized, <strong>as</strong> he later testified, that “all,<br />
absolutely all conditions for the possible<br />
success of such an offensive were lack-<br />
ing.” 5<br />
The weaknesses of the plan were di-<br />
agnosed by Rundstedt and Westphal <strong>as</strong><br />
follows: sufficient force w<strong>as</strong> not available<br />
to attain the distant goal of Antwerp; the<br />
German situation on the Western Front<br />
w<strong>as</strong> so precarious that it w<strong>as</strong> question-<br />
able whether the divisions slated for the<br />
offensive could be kept out of the moil<br />
of battle prior to D-day; the Allies might<br />
launch an offensive of their own, “spoil-<br />
ing” the German attack; the northern<br />
and southern flanks of the offensive<br />
would be dangerously open, the ex-<br />
posure incre<strong>as</strong>ing with every mile gained<br />
in the advance; finally, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a better<br />
than average chance that all the attack<br />
could produce would be a salient or<br />
bulge of the Great War variety, consum-<br />
ing too many German divisions in what<br />
would be ultimately only a holding op-<br />
eration. The solution, <strong>as</strong> seen by Rund-<br />
stedt and Westphal, w<strong>as</strong> to produce an<br />
operations order which would be less<br />
ambitious <strong>as</strong> to the terrain to be con-<br />
quered and which would aim at maxi-<br />
mum destruction of Allied forces with<br />
minimum risk.<br />
The OB WEST appraisal of Allied<br />
strength, <strong>as</strong> set forth in Martin, ac-<br />
corded the Allies a two to one superior-<br />
ity. Although the front w<strong>as</strong> relatively<br />
quiet, the main Allied effort w<strong>as</strong> recog-<br />
nized <strong>as</strong> being directed against the flanks<br />
of the German line (the Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong><br />
in the north and the Nineteenth <strong>Army</strong><br />
in the south). But the German long-<br />
5 Rundstedt Testimony, Trial of the Major War<br />
Criminals Before the International <strong>Military</strong> Tri-<br />
bunal (Nuremberg, 12 August 1946) vol. XXXI,<br />
P. 29.<br />
range estimate of Allied intentions pre-<br />
dicted that the Allies first would attempt<br />
to clear the Schelde estuary, <strong>as</strong> a pre-<br />
liminary to opening the port of Antwerp,<br />
and follow with a shift to the Venlo-<br />
Aachen sector <strong>as</strong> a b<strong>as</strong>e for operations<br />
against the Ruhr. Recognizing, t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
fore, that the Allied north wing with its<br />
four armies w<strong>as</strong> heavily weighted, Plan<br />
Martin emph<strong>as</strong>ized protection of the<br />
north flank of the attack, adding extra<br />
divisions for this purpose and feeding in<br />
a vital secondary attack by six divisions<br />
debouching from the salient south of<br />
Roermond.<br />
The axis of the advance, <strong>as</strong> pro-<br />
posed in Martin, would be Butgenbach–<br />
Trois Ponts–Werbomont–Ourthe River-<br />
a Meuse crossing north of the line Huy-<br />
Antwerp. The Fifth and Sixth Panzer<br />
Armies, right and left, would attack on<br />
a narrow front, the main strength of the<br />
two armies driving between Simmerath<br />
and Bleialf on a front of only twenty-five<br />
miles. This w<strong>as</strong> the salient feature of the<br />
Rundstedt plan: a heavy concentration<br />
for breakthrough on a narrow front. The<br />
area selected for the thrust of this sharp,<br />
narrow wedge offered the best tank go-<br />
ing to be found; no rivers need be<br />
crossed by the main attack until the<br />
Ourthe w<strong>as</strong> reached. Flank cover would<br />
be given by the advance of the Fifteenth<br />
<strong>Army</strong> in the north and the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> in the south. The secondary attack<br />
from the Roermond sector, heavy with<br />
armor, would effect a juncture with the<br />
main advance near Liège.<br />
Plan Martin, then, exemplified Rund-<br />
stedt’s desire to design and cut a coat<br />
matching the amount of cloth he ex-<br />
pected to have. He wanted immediate<br />
results, to be won by a quick break-<br />
through on a narrow front, with the
26 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
entire field of battle reduced consider-<br />
ably in size from the maneuver area<br />
envisaged in the original Hitler direc-<br />
tive. The simultaneous secondary thrust<br />
from the Roermond salient w<strong>as</strong> regarded<br />
by Rundstedt <strong>as</strong> essential to the OB<br />
WEST plan.<br />
At Fichtenhain near Krefeld, in a<br />
group of modern buildings which had<br />
been erected <strong>as</strong> a nursing home for alco-<br />
holics, Field Marshal Model and a small<br />
fragment of his army group staff also<br />
busied themselves with an answer to the<br />
Hitler directive. Despite his avowed<br />
loyalty to the party and Fuehrer, Model’s<br />
reaction to Krebs’ report had been caus-<br />
tic in the extreme: “This plan h<strong>as</strong>n’t got<br />
a damned leg to stand on.” 6 Antwerp,<br />
in Model’s opinion, w<strong>as</strong> beyond reach<br />
without more forces than were available.<br />
As Rundstedt had done, Model pro-<br />
ceeded to whittle away at the grandiose<br />
plan which had come from the Wolf’s<br />
Lair. Even more than OB WEST, Model<br />
and his staff feared the Allied threat in<br />
the Aachen sector. Sensitive to this and<br />
anxious to concentrate <strong>as</strong> much of the<br />
limited means <strong>as</strong> possible in the main<br />
punch, Model at once rejected the idea<br />
of a two-pronged attack. The <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group B plan, called Herbstnebel (au-<br />
tumn fog), <strong>as</strong>signed the armored forma-<br />
tions which Rundstedt intended to<br />
employ in the secondary thrust from<br />
Roermond to a general reserve in the<br />
Düren area; from t<strong>here</strong> this armor could<br />
be thrown in <strong>as</strong> the second wave of the<br />
main drive, or, if need be, rushed to<br />
bolster the defenses in the Aachen sector.<br />
The Herbstnebel plan called for a<br />
single powerful thrust on a front about<br />
forty miles wide, the breakthrough to be<br />
6 Interv, Luttichau with Metzsch, 14–19 Mar 52.<br />
achieved between the Hurtgen Forest<br />
and Lützkampen with the Fifth and<br />
Sixth Panzer Armies leading the attack.<br />
On the left wing the Seventh <strong>Army</strong><br />
would not make an immediate advance<br />
<strong>as</strong> in the OB WEST maneuver, but<br />
would follow in the track of the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> <strong>as</strong> a second wave. In con-<br />
tr<strong>as</strong>t to the wedge formation advocated<br />
by OB WEST for the main thrust, in<br />
which forces echeloned to the rear would<br />
develop a kind of snowplow effect roll-<br />
ing back the enemy on the flanks, the<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group B maneuver represented a<br />
mechanized and motorized version of the<br />
Napoleonic carré in which the main dis-<br />
position for the rupture of the enemy<br />
position w<strong>as</strong> a square with two forma-<br />
tions abre<strong>as</strong>t in the lead and two<br />
formations following on the same axis.<br />
The weight accorded the main thrust by<br />
the two panzer armies w<strong>as</strong> about the<br />
same in both plans; both would employ<br />
seven armored divisions, but Model pro-<br />
vided thirteen infantry divisions <strong>as</strong> com-<br />
pared with Rundstedt’s ten.<br />
The two plans finally were presented<br />
on 27 October in a joint conference at<br />
Fichtenhain. On this occ<strong>as</strong>ion the gen-<br />
erals nominated to command the par-<br />
ticipating armies (General der Pan-<br />
zertruppen H<strong>as</strong>so-Eccard von Man-<br />
teuffel, Generaloberst der Waffen-SS<br />
Josef “Sepp” Dietrich, and General der<br />
Panzertruppen Erich Brandenberger)<br />
joined the OB WEST and <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
B commanders and their chiefs of staff.<br />
In an initial briefing by Rundstedt, the<br />
problems of cover and deception were<br />
enumerated with solutions about the<br />
same <strong>as</strong> those employed in the final op-<br />
eration. Cover would be b<strong>as</strong>ed on the<br />
idea, Defensive Battle in the West.<br />
Deception would aim at attracting the
PLANNING THE COUNTEROFFENSIVE 27<br />
attention of the enemy to the sector<br />
northwest of Cologne w<strong>here</strong> the <strong>as</strong>sem-<br />
bly of troops and supplies would be made<br />
openly and in daylight, the whole ruse<br />
abetted by an incre<strong>as</strong>e in radio traffic.<br />
After a meeting that l<strong>as</strong>ted several<br />
hours, Model agreed to submit a new<br />
army group plan incorporating most of<br />
OB WEST’s Martin study. Actually<br />
Model and Rundstedt found themselves<br />
in accord on only one point, that the<br />
Hitler scheme for seizing Antwerp w<strong>as</strong><br />
too ambitious and that t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no pur-<br />
pose to plans carrying beyond the Meuse<br />
River. Quite independently, or so it<br />
would appear, the two headquarters had<br />
arrived at the Small Solution, or the en-<br />
velopment of the enemy e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
Meuse River. The fact that Model w<strong>as</strong><br />
violently opposed to the Fuehrer’s solu-<br />
tion and thus could expect no support<br />
from OKW may have made him more<br />
amenable to Rundstedt’s exercise of the<br />
command decision. When the revised<br />
Model plan arrived at OB WEST head-<br />
quarters on 28 October, it followed the<br />
general outline of the Martin plan. All<br />
of this work w<strong>as</strong> preparatory to the re-<br />
ceipt of further instructions promised by<br />
Jodl. These arrived at OB WEST head-<br />
quarters by special courier during the<br />
night of 2 November.<br />
The Big Solution<br />
Jodl’s preliminary plan had gone to<br />
Hitler on 21 October. The directive now<br />
handed the C-in-C West had been signed<br />
and dispatched from the Wolf’s Lair on<br />
1 November. Why this delay in issuing<br />
the directive? Jodl and Hitler met sev-<br />
eral times a day. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no need to<br />
wait for information coming from lower<br />
headquarters. Time, it w<strong>as</strong> obvious to<br />
all, w<strong>as</strong> running out.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is only one explanation for this<br />
surprising delay and it is supported by<br />
what is known of the working relation-<br />
ship between the Fuehrer and the chief<br />
of his planning staff. Probably one can-<br />
not say that the whole of this extended<br />
period w<strong>as</strong> devoted to argument; that<br />
would have been inadmissible to Hitler<br />
and not in keeping with Jodl’s character.<br />
But it is known that the two men were<br />
in fundamental disagreement on the ob-<br />
jective of the planned counteroffensive.<br />
Jodl’s technique would have been to<br />
postpone the final drafting and dispatch<br />
of the directive while he and Buttlar-<br />
Brandenfels tried to “sell” Hitler, push-<br />
ing a little at a time but withdrawing<br />
when storm warnings appeared.<br />
This conflict of ide<strong>as</strong>, for it hardly can<br />
be called a personal controversy, saw the<br />
Small Solution opposed to the Big Solu-<br />
tion, or Grand Slam. The point of disa-<br />
greement had risen when Hitler com-<br />
bined into one the two separate plans<br />
favored by the WFSt: the attack from<br />
Venlo to seize Antwerp, and the double<br />
envelopment of Liege by pincers from<br />
northern Luxembourg and from the<br />
Aachen area. Jodl and his aides had in-<br />
tended that the forces available would be<br />
employed in one of the favored plans and<br />
one only. A sweeping enlargement on the<br />
original WFSt concept, such <strong>as</strong> Hitler<br />
demanded, would require perhaps twice<br />
<strong>as</strong> many new divisions on the Western<br />
Front <strong>as</strong> the twenty-one that were to be<br />
provided from the OKW strategic re-<br />
serve.<br />
Jodl seems to have had no hesitation<br />
about setting the two alternatives before<br />
Hitler. First, he could go ahead with the<br />
Big Solution, aiming at the seizure of
28<br />
Antwerp and the encirclement and de-<br />
struction of the Allied forces north of the<br />
line B<strong>as</strong>togne-Brussels-Antwerp. This<br />
would require a dr<strong>as</strong>tic revision of Ger-<br />
man strategy on all fronts. Combat<br />
divisions would have to be stripped from<br />
the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front in particular and<br />
given to OB WEST. Replacements and<br />
supplies for other fronts than the west<br />
would have to be reduced to a mere<br />
trickle. Obviously ground would have to<br />
be surrendered elsew<strong>here</strong> if the great<br />
attack in the west were to be successful;<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore local commanders must be al-<br />
lowed to make their own decisions <strong>as</strong> to<br />
retrograde movement. (Surely Hitler<br />
must have gagged on this item.) This<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not all. Jodl and Buttlar-Brandenfels<br />
recommended extreme me<strong>as</strong>ures to<br />
wring the extra divisions which the Big<br />
Solution required out of the German<br />
people. The Third Reich would have to<br />
be turned into a fortress under martial<br />
law, with total mobilization of men,<br />
women, and children-a step which w<strong>as</strong><br />
not taken in fact until the spring of 1945.<br />
If Hitler would not adopt the extreme<br />
me<strong>as</strong>ures needed to implement the Big<br />
Solution with an adequate number of<br />
new divisions, then he should accept the<br />
alternate or Small Solution. In this the<br />
object would be the seizure of Liège and<br />
the envelopment of those enemy forces<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of the Meuse in the sector roughly<br />
demarcated by Givet (on the Meuse) in<br />
the south, and Sittard (twenty miles<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t of Aachen) in the north.<br />
Hitler ridiculed the Small Solution <strong>as</strong><br />
nothing but a half me<strong>as</strong>ure which could<br />
produce no real success. At the same time<br />
he w<strong>as</strong> unwilling to adopt the stern me<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ures necessary to make the Big Solution<br />
a success. Despite all protestations that<br />
the final battle would be won or lost in<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the west, the Fuehrer could not bring<br />
himself to take troops from the E<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
Front and stake everything on a quick<br />
decision in the west. Stubbornly, Hitler<br />
ad<strong>here</strong>d to Antwerp <strong>as</strong> the goal of the<br />
attack and the proposition that it could<br />
be achieved with only those thirty divi-<br />
sions or so which could be raised by<br />
OKW or saved out of the ruck by OB<br />
WEST.<br />
By the end of October it must have<br />
been apparent to Jodl that Hitler could<br />
not be moved, nor could the letter<br />
of instruction to the C-in-C West be<br />
longer delayed. The Fuehrer instruc-<br />
tions signed on 1 November were sent<br />
to Rundstedt with a brief covering letter<br />
dictated by Jodl. Two sentences from<br />
Jodl warned Rundstedt that Hitler had<br />
plumped irrevocably for the Big Solu-<br />
tion: “The venture for the far-flung<br />
objective [Antwerp] is unalterable al-<br />
though, from a strictly technical stand-<br />
point, it appears to be disproportionate<br />
to our available forces. In our present<br />
situation, however, we must not shrink<br />
from staking everything on one card.” 7<br />
Rundstedt’s answer, sent to Jodl on 3<br />
November, followed the German mili-<br />
tary tradition by which a commander<br />
w<strong>as</strong> entitled to state his objection to<br />
orders for the record. The forces avail-<br />
able for Wacht am Rhein, he wrote,<br />
were “extremely weak in comparison to<br />
the enemy and the zone of action”; then<br />
he voiced his “grave doubts whether it<br />
would be possible to hold the ground<br />
won, unless the enemy is completely de-<br />
stroyed.” 8 But these words for the record<br />
ended Rundstedt’s efforts for a more<br />
7 Ltr, Jodl to Westphal, 1 Nov 44, OB WEST,<br />
KTB Anlage 50, vol. I, pp. 30–31.<br />
8 Ltr, Rundstedt to Jodl, 3 Nov 44, OB WEST,<br />
KTB Anlage 50, vol. I, pp. 47–50.
PLANNING THE COUNTEROFFENSIVE 29<br />
re<strong>as</strong>onable plan; he refused to appeal to<br />
Hitler in person, <strong>as</strong> Westphal urged, on<br />
the ground that it w<strong>as</strong> futile to expect a<br />
favorable hearing from the Fuehrer.<br />
A Double Envelopment?<br />
Closely linked with the Big Solution<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the question of the form in which<br />
the attack should be delivered. The Hit-<br />
ler concept called for a single thrust on<br />
a wide front; this broad zone of action,<br />
so the argument ran, would make it dif-<br />
ficult for the enemy to concentrate his<br />
forces for a riposte. When the Allies<br />
commenced to react, and only then, a<br />
secondary attack would be launched in<br />
the north from the Venlo area by two<br />
army corps under <strong>Army</strong> Group H (Stu-<br />
dent). Rundstedt, on the other hand,<br />
hoped to deny the enemy the ability to<br />
m<strong>as</strong>s for a counterthrust by employing a<br />
double envelopment, the two prongs of<br />
the attack moving simultaneously from<br />
their jump-off positions. His reply, on<br />
3 November, to the OKW instructions<br />
w<strong>as</strong> phr<strong>as</strong>ed most carefully, but despite<br />
the protestation that the points of dif-<br />
ference between the OKW and OB<br />
WEST plans were “unessential,” Rund-<br />
stedt made clear his opinion that a con-<br />
centric maneuver w<strong>as</strong> a must:<br />
It is a requisite that a powerful [sec-<br />
ondary] attack be launched from the area<br />
Susteren-Geilenkirchen simultaneously with<br />
the [main attack] of Sixth SS Panzer, Fifth<br />
Panzer and Seventh Armies; otherwise the<br />
destruction of the strong [Allied] forces<br />
already concentrated in the Sittard-Liège-<br />
Monschau triangle cannot be achieved. 9<br />
Rundstedt then politely bowed in the<br />
direction of Hitler’s scheme for the<br />
follow-up attack in Holland: “After<br />
9 Ibid.<br />
successful execution [of this operation],<br />
strung forces will be free for deployment<br />
in one of two possible courses of action<br />
depending upon the situation; either in<br />
support of the attack of <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
Student, or in a northward thrust via<br />
Ma<strong>as</strong>tricht.” 10<br />
Although Model and <strong>Army</strong> Group B<br />
were not consulted in the preparation<br />
of this answer from Rundstedt to Jodl,<br />
the army group planners made h<strong>as</strong>te to<br />
repudiate any plan for a simultaneous<br />
two-pronged attack. The force making<br />
up the northern arm in Rundstedt’s<br />
scheme, the XII SS Corps, w<strong>as</strong> too weak<br />
to carry through a simultaneous second-<br />
ary attack; nor would Model agree to<br />
further reduction of the main effort <strong>as</strong><br />
a step in beefing up the northern thrust.<br />
The OB WEST chief of staff could do<br />
no more than note this disclaimer from<br />
the subordinate headquarters: “The<br />
simultaneous attack of the XII SS Corps<br />
is regarded <strong>as</strong> essential by Field Mar-<br />
shal von Rundstedt for the purpose of<br />
tying down [the enemy]. Considering<br />
the weakness of our forces, OKW is of<br />
the same opinion <strong>as</strong> you. We will have to<br />
await a decision.” 11<br />
This came four days later in the<br />
Fuehrer’s operations directive of 10<br />
November. Quite obviously Rundstedt’s<br />
plea for the double envelopment had<br />
gone unheeded. Indeed, Hitler seems to<br />
have taken upon himself the t<strong>as</strong>k of bury-<br />
ing this idea, for the copy of the opera-<br />
tions directive prepared for his signature<br />
h<strong>as</strong> a sentence inserted after the main<br />
text w<strong>as</strong> typed: “In this sector [reference<br />
is being made to the Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong><br />
which Hitler had <strong>as</strong>signed the mission<br />
10 Ibid.<br />
11 Ltr, Westphal to Krebs, 6 Nov 44, OB WEST,<br />
KTB Anlage 50, vol. I, pp. 67–70.
30<br />
of holding attacks on the northern flank]<br />
the enemy must not be warned in ad-<br />
vance by secondary attacks.” 12 The<br />
simultaneous attack in the north thus<br />
w<strong>as</strong> forbidden, its place to be taken by<br />
a series of holding attacks at some un-<br />
specified time in the dim and distant<br />
final ph<strong>as</strong>es of the projected operation.<br />
It appeared that Rundstedt’s concen-<br />
tric attack had followed the Small Solu-<br />
tion into limbo. Certainly the OB WEST<br />
commander showed no readiness to de-<br />
fend his brain-child after the Hitler<br />
edict. Model, however, stood in a some-<br />
what more favored position vis-à-vis<br />
Jodl and Hitler <strong>as</strong> befitted a field mar-<br />
shal who w<strong>as</strong> a rabidly loyal Nazi. Cir-<br />
cumstances now were in conspiracy to<br />
make Model the ball carrier for the OB<br />
WEST two-pronged attack, which he<br />
had disavowed, and for the Small Solu-<br />
tion, supposedly dead and buried.<br />
The plans and preparations prelim-<br />
inary to the Ardennes counteroffensive,<br />
it must be recognized, were not produced<br />
in a vacuum. The war in the west, some-<br />
what somnolent during October, had<br />
flared up again in November with the<br />
U.S. Third <strong>Army</strong> attack in the Metz<br />
sector and the combined offensive which<br />
the U.S. First and Ninth Armies had<br />
launched on 16 November with the in-<br />
tention of breaking through the German<br />
defenses e<strong>as</strong>t of Aachen and driving to<br />
the Rhine. 13 The latter operation, desig-<br />
nated by the Germans <strong>as</strong> the Third<br />
Battle of Aachen but known to Ameri-<br />
12 OKW Operation Directive of 10 Nov 44, OB<br />
WEST, KTB Anlage 50, vol I, pp. 95–104.<br />
13 On the attacks made by the U.S. First and<br />
Third Armies in November 1944 see Charles B.<br />
MacDonald, The Siegfried Line Campaign,<br />
UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II<br />
(W<strong>as</strong>hington, 1963) and Cole, The Lorraine Cam-<br />
paign.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
cans <strong>as</strong> the Battle of the Hurtgen Forest,<br />
had been forec<strong>as</strong>t with bitter foreboding<br />
in Model’s headquarters. On the very<br />
first day of the new Aachen offensive,<br />
Model proposed a limited operation<br />
against the northern wing of the U.S.<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> using troops which had been<br />
earmarked for Wacht am Rhein. The<br />
OB WEST and <strong>Army</strong> Group B com-<br />
manders now were able to forget their<br />
personal differences and the animosities<br />
engendered between their respective<br />
staffs in pursuit of the common object:<br />
the acceptance by Hitler of some type of<br />
Small Solution in which the means were<br />
appropriate to the end. Rundstedt’s for-<br />
warding letter, sent to Jodl on 18 No-<br />
vember while German losses in the<br />
Aachen battle were skyrocketing, backed<br />
Model to the hilt: “A surprise attack<br />
directed against the weakened enemy,<br />
after the conclusion of his unsuccessful<br />
breakthrough attempts in the greater<br />
Aachen area, offers the greatest chance of<br />
success.” 14 <strong>To</strong> achieve this, wrote Rund-<br />
stedt, he <strong>as</strong> the OB WEST commander<br />
must be given an absolutely free hand in<br />
determining when the attack should be<br />
made. He wrote this at a time when it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> evident to all that Hitler intended<br />
to keep every such decision in his own<br />
hands. W<strong>as</strong> the old Prussian field mar-<br />
shal encouraged to fly in the face of the<br />
Fuehrer directive because the young<br />
Nazi field marshal w<strong>as</strong> at his side? Or<br />
did some sense of obligation to the uni-<br />
form he had worn for fifty-four years<br />
impel Rundstedt to make a l<strong>as</strong>t effort to<br />
give the German troops who would take<br />
part in the coming battle the best pos-<br />
sible chance of success?<br />
14 Ltr, Rundstedt to Jodl, 18 Nov 44, OB WEST,<br />
KTB Anlage 50, vol. I, pp. 152–59.
PLANNING THE COUNTEROFFENSIVE 31<br />
By 20 November, divisions earmarked<br />
for Wacht am Rhein were in the line<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Aachen, and it appeared that still<br />
others would have to be used against<br />
Patton at Metz. On this date Model<br />
again enlisted Rundstedt’s support to<br />
brace Hitler. This time Model specific-<br />
ally <strong>as</strong>ked for an improvised limited<br />
double envelopment to destroy the four-<br />
teen Allied divisions in the Aachen sec-<br />
tor. Model argued that the attack he<br />
proposed would give <strong>as</strong> much tactical and<br />
psychological success <strong>as</strong> Wacht am Rhein,<br />
and that the destruction of such a large<br />
number of Allied divisions would be a<br />
necessary prerequisite for success in any<br />
future attack like Wacht am Rhein. Ap-<br />
parently the two Western Front com-<br />
manders were trying to drive a bargain<br />
with the Fuehrer: let us undertake a<br />
limited double envelopment in the<br />
Aachen area which will put us at the<br />
Meuse and eat up the enemy reserves;<br />
t<strong>here</strong>after, we will be in a position to<br />
regroup, bring fresh forces (not now<br />
available) forward, and undertake the<br />
drive to Antwerp. But Hitler would not<br />
bargain. The answer, relayed by Jodl on<br />
22 November, w<strong>as</strong> abrupt: “Preparations<br />
for an improvisation will not be made.” 15<br />
The workings of a dictatorship in a<br />
large and complex society are devious<br />
and hard to fathom. Hitler had degraded<br />
and executed German generals in the<br />
cruelest f<strong>as</strong>hion while Rundstedt and the<br />
German <strong>Of</strong>ficer Corps stood p<strong>as</strong>sively by.<br />
A vocal inflection, a doubting word, had<br />
been enough to break famous field com-<br />
manders. The great General Staff w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
complete disgrace, suffering constant rid-<br />
icule from Hitler in craven silence. In-<br />
15 Msg, Jodl to Rundstedt, 22 Nov 44, OB WEST,<br />
KTB Anlage 50, vol. II, p. 12. (Quotation is from<br />
Hitler.)<br />
structions issued by Hitler for the con-<br />
duct of operations were in such detail<br />
that field commanders of the stature of<br />
Rundstedt and Model lacked the author-<br />
ity to move units <strong>as</strong> small <strong>as</strong> divisions.<br />
Whenever a field commander appeared<br />
at the Wolf’s Lair he found the atmos-<br />
p<strong>here</strong> formal and chilling. The<br />
imputation of cowardice and tre<strong>as</strong>on<br />
w<strong>as</strong> commonplace. Despite all this, the<br />
Fuehrer’s personal dictatorship suffered<br />
the limitations and strictures which seem<br />
to be a part of all modern dictatorships.<br />
The armies under his command had<br />
suffered reverses and his personal pres-<br />
tige <strong>as</strong> war lord had declined. The<br />
generals who had been raised to power<br />
by the Nazi party <strong>as</strong> Nazis could not be<br />
broken without weakening the dictator-<br />
ship of the party. Finally, the number of<br />
generals with proven ability and public<br />
prestige, at this stage of the war, w<strong>as</strong><br />
relatively small. Even the Supreme War<br />
Lord would have to listen to men of<br />
prestige who had the courage to risk his<br />
disfavor.<br />
Jodl visited OB WEST headquarters<br />
on 26 November, only to find that Rund-<br />
stedt and Model were determined to<br />
cling to the Small Solution and the con-<br />
cept of concentric attack. Once again<br />
Hitler handed down his edict: “T<strong>here</strong><br />
will be absolutely no change in the<br />
present intentions.” But Model w<strong>as</strong> tena-<br />
cious. Taking advantage of a conference<br />
which Hitler called in Berlin on 2 De-<br />
cember, Model brought forward his<br />
heavy artillery: Sepp Dietrich, Hitler’s<br />
old crony, and “Little” Manteuffel, the<br />
panzer general with the big reputation,<br />
both supporters of the Small Solution.<br />
Still Hitler refused to budge. One l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
attempt to win over the Fuehrer w<strong>as</strong><br />
made four days later when Rundstedt
32<br />
and Model submitted their final draft of<br />
the operations order for Wacht am<br />
Rhein. The accompanying map showed<br />
a second prong to the attack, this carried<br />
<strong>as</strong> in the first OB WEST plan by the<br />
XII SS Corps. Again Hitler rejected the<br />
suggestion.<br />
In the final version of the operations<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
order for the counteroffensive, approved<br />
by Hitler on 9 December, the scope and<br />
ultimate objective were exactly <strong>as</strong> they<br />
had been conceived by Hitler and pre-<br />
sented to the OB WEST and <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group B chiefs of staff when these offi-<br />
cers were initiated in the plan on 22<br />
October.
The Order of Battle<br />
During the long-drawn debate over<br />
the extent of the counteroffensive, the<br />
objective, and the attack form to be em-<br />
ployed, the order of battle for Wacht am<br />
Rhein took form. This also led to dif-<br />
ferences of opinion and interpretation.<br />
How should the armies be aligned? What<br />
forces, missions, and zones should be<br />
<strong>as</strong>signed to each particular army? How<br />
many divisions, armored and infantry,<br />
would be available for use in the attack?<br />
The answers to these and like questions<br />
turned on the “Solution” adopted and<br />
the maneuver employed but will be set<br />
forth independently in an attempt to<br />
bring some order out of the confused<br />
interplay between Hitler, Jodl, Rund-<br />
stedt, and Model.<br />
When the representatives of OB<br />
WEST and <strong>Army</strong> Group B first heard<br />
of the Defensive Battle in the West, the<br />
Fuehrer had given Model, <strong>as</strong> the com-<br />
mander directly charged with the opera-<br />
tion, three armies: the Fifth and Sixth<br />
Panzer Armies and the Seventh <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
Subsequently Hitler added the Fifteenth<br />
<strong>Army</strong> for a special role, although it<br />
would appear that he did not intend to<br />
take the Fifteenth away from <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group Student until after the battle w<strong>as</strong><br />
joined. At the time Westphal and Krebs<br />
rejoined their respective headquarters<br />
they were in possession of a rather gen-<br />
CHAPTER III<br />
Troops and Terrain<br />
eral plan of maneuver and a list of<br />
divisions numbering 29. Hitler had per-<br />
sonally promised 30 divisions, of which<br />
12 were to be armored. From this point<br />
forward t<strong>here</strong> would be a constant ques-<br />
tion posed in each draft plan: how many<br />
divisions and which divisions? By 1<br />
November, <strong>as</strong> planning progressed, the<br />
Hitler-Jodl estimate of the divisions<br />
which could be employed rose to 39, of<br />
which 13 would be armored. On the<br />
other hand the estimates fed into the<br />
successive OB WEST planning papers<br />
revolved between 29 and 31 divisions,<br />
with 12 armored divisions <strong>as</strong> a constant.<br />
It is the one extra panzer unit found in<br />
the OKW order of battle which fur-<br />
nishes the key to the conundrum <strong>as</strong> to<br />
the number of divisions. This unit, the<br />
21st Panzer Division, belonged to <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group G and w<strong>as</strong> committed <strong>as</strong> a roving<br />
halfback, stiffening those parts of the<br />
line w<strong>here</strong> attacks by the Third and<br />
Seventh U.S. Armies threatened to<br />
penetrate. Rundstedt knew that the<br />
21st simply could not be stripped from<br />
the German south flank, already pre-<br />
cariously thin. His list of “available”<br />
divisions, t<strong>here</strong>fore did not name those<br />
divisions already fully committed in<br />
sectors w<strong>here</strong> the Allied threat loomed<br />
large. Be it noted, then, that the Hitler-<br />
Jodl listing of available divisions did not<br />
contain a single new formation (from<br />
the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front or Italy for example)
34<br />
but simply reckoned on withdrawing<br />
more divisions from other sectors of the<br />
Western Front and throwing them into<br />
the counteroffensive force.<br />
Fancy footwork in extending the<br />
length of the order of battle at OKW<br />
had a direct correlation with the align-<br />
ment of forces laid down in Hitler’s<br />
letter of instructions on 1 November. In<br />
this the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> would be<br />
deployed on the right or north flank of<br />
the attack formation and would make<br />
the main effort. In the center would be<br />
the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>; on the left the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong>. This disposition w<strong>as</strong><br />
“unalterable.” The decision to let the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> gather the largest<br />
sheaf of laurel leaves, if any, w<strong>as</strong> politi-<br />
cally inspired. Its commander, Sepp<br />
Dietrich, w<strong>as</strong> high in the party and the<br />
panzer divisions <strong>as</strong>signed for the attack<br />
were SS divisions. Hitler’s letter on 1<br />
November calls Dietrich’s command the<br />
Sixth SS Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, a Freudian slip<br />
for this army did not officially bear the<br />
title SS and would not for some time to<br />
come. The question at issue, however,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the location of the Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong>. Rundstedt wanted the main effort<br />
to be launched in the center and so<br />
wished to reverse the position of the two<br />
panzer armies in the final deployment.<br />
But this w<strong>as</strong> only one of several points<br />
at which the deployment outlined by<br />
OB WEST in the Martin plan (<strong>as</strong><br />
finally agreed to by Model) differed<br />
from that given by Hitler’s 1 November<br />
letter of instructions. (See Map I.)<br />
The Hitler-Jodl plan provided for an<br />
attack to be carried by the three armies<br />
of <strong>Army</strong> Group B advancing abre<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
Plan Martin placed the Seventh <strong>Army</strong><br />
to the left and rear of the two <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
armies with its northern corps advancing<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
behind the southern wing of the attack.<br />
Correspondingly, the Hitler-Jodl attack<br />
issued from an attack front sixty-five<br />
miles wide; the Martin attack took off<br />
from a forty-mile-wide b<strong>as</strong>e. In the first<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e the southern terminus of the pene-<br />
tration would be Grevenmacher; in<br />
Martin this terminus w<strong>as</strong> set at D<strong>as</strong>burg.<br />
W<strong>here</strong> the Hitler-Jodl attack moved<br />
straight through the Belgian Ardennes,<br />
that outlined in Martin skimmed the<br />
northern edge of the Ardennes. <strong>Of</strong> the<br />
thirteen panzer divisions listed by Hitler<br />
and Jodl, only four would be thrown into<br />
the first wave with six following in the<br />
second wave. The remaining three were<br />
to be held out for later employment in<br />
the holding attacks planned for <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group Student. In Martin, contrariwise,<br />
Rundstedt put all of the panzer divisions<br />
he counted <strong>as</strong> available (twelve in num-<br />
ber) in the first attack wave. As to<br />
reserves, the Hitler-Jodl order of battle<br />
counted four divisions in this category<br />
but provided for their commitment <strong>as</strong><br />
the third wave of the attack. Rundstedt,<br />
far more concerned than OKW with the<br />
potential weakness of the southern flank,<br />
would <strong>as</strong>semble the three divisions of his<br />
reserve along the southern boundary of<br />
the expanding salient.<br />
When, on 10 November, Hitler signed<br />
the operation directive Wacht am Rhein,<br />
it became clear that Rundstedt’s Plan<br />
Martin had been sunk without trace.<br />
This w<strong>as</strong> now<strong>here</strong> more evident than in<br />
the order of battle. The revised Hitler-<br />
Jodl list gave an impressive total of 4<br />
armies (the Fifteenth had been added),<br />
11 army corps, and 38 divisions (15<br />
motorized and mechanized and 23 infan-<br />
try), plus 9 Volks artillery corps and 7<br />
Volks Werfer brigades. By what sleight<br />
of hand had Jodl and the WFSt been able
TROOPS AND TERRAIN 35<br />
to raise divisions for the counteroffensive<br />
which the Western Front commanders<br />
could not see? The answer is found in a<br />
combination of self-mesmerism at Hit-<br />
ler’s headquarters and a kind of double<br />
entry order of battle. The <strong>as</strong>signment of<br />
the Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong>, fighting in the<br />
Aachen battle, theoretically added six<br />
divisions to the attacking force. The<br />
Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong>, however, w<strong>as</strong> not to be<br />
employed until the Allies had reacted in<br />
force to the German attack, and in any<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e could not be expected to launch a<br />
large-scale attack until the Allied front<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Aachen had been dr<strong>as</strong>tically de-<br />
nuded of troops. Furthermore, the actual<br />
count of divisions in the Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> deceptive. Two of the divisions (the<br />
49th Infantry and 246th Yolks Grena-<br />
dier) had been merged, the 49th being<br />
deactivated. This merger had been re-<br />
ported to the WFSt but the 49th con-<br />
tinued on the Hitler-Jodl list. Another<br />
organization listed, the 89th Infantry<br />
Division, amounted to the strength of a<br />
single rifle battalion. Both OB WEST<br />
and <strong>Army</strong> Group B had <strong>as</strong>ked for its<br />
disbandment, but this request w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
fused at the Fuehrer level.<br />
An error of potentially greater import<br />
existed in the listing of three panzer-type<br />
divisions supposedly to come from other<br />
sectors of the Western Front. Rund-<br />
stedt’s protest against the nomination of<br />
the 21st Panzer Division <strong>as</strong> “available”<br />
h<strong>as</strong> already been noted. Also tied down<br />
by the Allied attacks on the <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
G front w<strong>as</strong> the 17th SS Panzer Grena-<br />
dier Division. In addition, the 10th SS<br />
Panzer Division, involved in the fight<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Aachen, had a very limited com-<br />
bat capability. But when Model at-<br />
tempted to replace this formation with<br />
a green parachute division, OKW turned<br />
down the relief because the second divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> ticketed for Wacht am Rhein.<br />
In effect the felony w<strong>as</strong> compounded in-<br />
sofar <strong>as</strong> the three panzer-type divisions<br />
were concerned. Not only w<strong>as</strong> it very un-<br />
likely that they could be taken out of<br />
sectors w<strong>here</strong> they already were hotly<br />
engaged, but each w<strong>as</strong> so weakened by<br />
constant fighting-the 21st Panzer Divi-<br />
sion and 17th SS Panzer Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion had been in line without a break<br />
since the Allied inv<strong>as</strong>ion of Normandy-<br />
that the two together no longer had the<br />
combat value of a single full division.<br />
The chain of events leading to the<br />
issuance of the questionable Hitler-Jodl<br />
order of battle w<strong>as</strong> vicious in its work-<br />
ing-but the sequence w<strong>as</strong> not ended.<br />
Hitler had determined on a military so-<br />
lution in which the means were not ade-<br />
quate to the end desired. His comman-<br />
ders at first had attempted to bring the<br />
objective into some proper relation to<br />
the available means. As a retort to these<br />
efforts, Jodl and the WFSt had sup-<br />
ported the Fuehrer scheme by an inflated<br />
listing of additional available divisions.<br />
The higher field commanders then<br />
bowed to the inevitable, although they<br />
personally were aware that the troop list<br />
attached to the final operation directive<br />
of 10 November w<strong>as</strong> probably phony, or<br />
at le<strong>as</strong>t highly suspect. The troop list<br />
t<strong>here</strong>after would be duplicated in army<br />
group, army, corps, and division orders<br />
and plans. Commanders and staffs in<br />
lower echelons could have little or no<br />
knowledge of the questionable b<strong>as</strong>is of<br />
the troop list. Each time the list w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
produced it became more of a solid fact.<br />
When a corps commander w<strong>as</strong> informed<br />
that he would be given one of the divi-<br />
sions whose availability originally had<br />
been questioned by Rundstedt or Model,
36 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
he accepted this <strong>as</strong> a fact and made. his<br />
plans accordingly. This w<strong>as</strong> true at the<br />
army level-and eventually even at the<br />
headquarters of <strong>Army</strong> Group B. Con-<br />
stant repetition would turn a hypothesis,<br />
mendacious by origin, into a military<br />
“fact.” T<strong>here</strong> is a lesson <strong>here</strong> for those<br />
who may be called upon to plan large-<br />
scale military operations in the future.<br />
The Allies Return to the Attack<br />
Rundstedt’s immediate reaction to the<br />
outline Fuehrer plan brought back to the<br />
OB WEST headquarters by his chief of<br />
staff on 24 October had been a caveat:<br />
the entire project for a German counter-<br />
offensive would have to be abandoned if<br />
the Western Allies launched any large-<br />
scale attack. Rundstedt w<strong>as</strong> not simply<br />
being cagey. He w<strong>as</strong> worried by the gen-<br />
eral quiet which had fallen over the<br />
Western Front following the American<br />
penetration of the West Wall outworks<br />
at Aachen. He anticipated that the Allies<br />
would make new attacks in the Aachen<br />
and Metz sectors <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> their divi-<br />
sions were refitted and resupplied. The<br />
C-in-C West especially feared a thrust<br />
from the Aachen salient to the Ruhr and<br />
had so advised Hitler, <strong>as</strong>king <strong>as</strong> w<strong>as</strong> his<br />
wont for reserves. Rundstedt’s request<br />
for nine fresh divisions lay unanswered<br />
in the files of OKW until Westphal<br />
finally brought the news that OB WEST<br />
would not be given the nine divisions<br />
requested but instead would have to take<br />
nine divisions out of the line in the west<br />
and prepare them for use in the great<br />
counteroffensive. <strong>To</strong> make matters very<br />
much worse, OB WEST would lose two-<br />
thirds of its armored and mechanized<br />
troops during the rehabilitation period.<br />
After the meeting with Model at<br />
Fichtenhain, Rundstedt once again <strong>as</strong>ked<br />
for additional divisions to meet the im-<br />
pending Allied attack and repeated the<br />
warning that an Allied offensive would<br />
cancel the German plans. This time (3<br />
November) he specified the are<strong>as</strong> w<strong>here</strong><br />
the attack would be made: it would be a<br />
double thrust, one arm advancing from<br />
the Aachen front in the direction of<br />
Cologne, the other striking from the<br />
Metz sector toward Saarbrücken. Hit-<br />
ler’s reply, telegraphed two days later,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> unsympathetic. Rundstedt must hold<br />
with those divisions he had in the line.<br />
Divisions listed for Wacht am Rhein<br />
could be committed only if they became<br />
involved in a fight while <strong>as</strong>sembling in<br />
their future attack positions, although an<br />
exception could be made in the event<br />
of Allied airborne landings. Otherwise<br />
the commitment of any Wacht am Rhein<br />
formation must have the express permis-<br />
sion of the Fuehrer.<br />
Rundstedt’s prediction of things to<br />
come w<strong>as</strong> made good when the U.S.<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> opened a two-corps attack<br />
on 8 November. Within twenty-four<br />
hours Hitler w<strong>as</strong> in touch with OB<br />
WEST, reminding Rundstedt that he<br />
must keep his hands off the Wacht am<br />
Rhein divisions even if this meant giving<br />
ground all along the line. As a re<strong>as</strong>suring<br />
note OKW expressed the hope that the<br />
Allied attack would burn up divisions<br />
which might otherwise face the German<br />
counteroffensive.<br />
Now the C-in-C West w<strong>as</strong> responsible<br />
for two types of Wacht am Rhein divi-<br />
sions, those in the line which he must<br />
relieve for rest and refitting, and those<br />
which had been organized or rehabili-<br />
tated in the Reserve <strong>Army</strong> and dis-<br />
patched to Rundstedt’s command. The<br />
weight of armor in the American attack
TROOPS AND TERRAIN 37<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Metz and the possibility that this<br />
thrust would rupture the German south<br />
wing at the joint between the First and<br />
Nineteenth Armies, impelled Rund-<br />
stedt to cling to those tanks which were<br />
on the <strong>Army</strong> Group G front. This he did<br />
in flat disobedience of direct orders<br />
from OKW. He went a step further on<br />
21 November and ordered the Panzer<br />
Lehr Division out of its <strong>as</strong>sembly area<br />
and into a counterattack designed to<br />
block the American XV Corps, whose<br />
drive toward the Saverne Gap threat-<br />
ened to separate the First and Nine-<br />
teenth Armies. OKW ultimately agreed<br />
to this use of Panzer Lehr, but then<br />
called off the counterattack on 25 No-<br />
vember. The responsible Western Front<br />
commanders simply stalled the relief of<br />
the Panzer Lehr until it w<strong>as</strong> clear that<br />
the division had suffered too much dam-<br />
age to allow any further hope of success.<br />
The upshot of the Allied offensive in<br />
Lorraine w<strong>as</strong> that two panzer-type divi-<br />
sions scheduled for Wacht am Rhein be-<br />
came irretrievably embroiled in the<br />
losing battle being waged by <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group G, while the elite Panzer Lehr<br />
Division limped back to its <strong>as</strong>sembly area<br />
much reduced in strength and with<br />
badly shaken morale. None of the in-<br />
fantry divisions engaged in the battles<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Metz were scheduled for employ-<br />
ment in the Ardennes, but the redeploy-<br />
ment in the south of two divisions from<br />
the Eifel sector necessitated the prema-<br />
ture commitment of two Volks Grena-<br />
dier divisions from the Replacement<br />
<strong>Army</strong> <strong>as</strong> their relief. In addition the<br />
American attack in Lorraine would cost<br />
the Hitler offensive an entire Yolks<br />
artillery corps, two panzer brigades, and<br />
two heavy antitank battalions.<br />
The Third Battle of Aachen, begun<br />
on 16 November, w<strong>as</strong> even more threat-<br />
ening in the eyes of OB WEST than the<br />
Allied drive in Lorraine. Within twenty-<br />
four hours the situation w<strong>as</strong> so desperate<br />
that Model threw in his only tactical<br />
reserve, the XLVIII Panzer Corps. As<br />
the German c<strong>as</strong>ualties mounted on the<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group B front, Rundstedt began<br />
to bleed his north wing, taking one di-<br />
vision after another from <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
Student. By 20 November the prospect<br />
of an Allied breakthrough loomed so<br />
large that the C-in-C West <strong>as</strong>ked OKW<br />
for the four reserve SS panzer divisions<br />
which were being readied to carry the<br />
main Ardennes attack by the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. His request w<strong>as</strong> denied.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> ensued a tactical merry-go-<br />
round catching up divisions all the way<br />
from the Netherlands to Str<strong>as</strong>bourg.<br />
Rundstedt would bring in one of the di-<br />
visions which had been kept on ice for<br />
the coming offensive, relieve a battered<br />
division in the line, then in a few days<br />
shuffle the relieving division back to a<br />
reserve position close behind the line–<br />
sometimes with OKW approval, but<br />
more often without. Meanwhile the Ger-<br />
man artillery w<strong>as</strong> working desperately to<br />
take the place of tactical air support–so<br />
marked by its absence. As early <strong>as</strong> the<br />
third day of the attack the light and<br />
medium howitzers bolstering the <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group B positions were dipping into the<br />
special ammunition stocks which had<br />
been reserved by the Fuehrer for the<br />
Ardennes battle and which bore his im-<br />
print, Fuehrer Reserve. At the close of<br />
the first week of fighting in the Aachen<br />
area the German c<strong>as</strong>ualties t<strong>here</strong> had<br />
risen to 12,000. Replacements who had<br />
been sent forward to reflesh the divisions<br />
being reorganized for Wacht am Rhein<br />
found themselves filling the gaping ranks
38 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
of formations in the line. By the first<br />
week of December the Aachen battle<br />
had resulted in the direct commitment<br />
or a cessation of training and rehabilita-<br />
tion in the c<strong>as</strong>e of five panzer-type and<br />
seven infantry divisions. An additional<br />
six Volks artillery corps had been<br />
tossed into the fray but, made up of<br />
over-age reservists, they probably prof-<br />
ited by this enforced training period.<br />
It is hardly surprising that the impact<br />
of the attacks around Aachen and Metz<br />
should have further shaken Rundstedt’s<br />
and Model’s already wavering belief in<br />
the possibility of any large me<strong>as</strong>ure of<br />
success for the Ardennes counteroffen-<br />
sive. Model reacted more strongly than<br />
Rundstedt, the latter fatigued by the<br />
constant tug of war with OKW and more<br />
and more adopting the resignation of<br />
the aged. When Model again took up the<br />
cudgels for the Small Solution, stress-<br />
ing the paucity of forces left for the<br />
counteroffensive, he sounded a prophetic<br />
warning: “Should the attack be stopped<br />
at the Meuse due to the lack of reserves<br />
the only result will be a bulge in the<br />
line and not the destruction of sizable<br />
enemy forces [italics supplied]. . . .<br />
The widely stretched flanks, especially<br />
in the south, will only invite enemy<br />
counteractions.” Hitler answered by <strong>as</strong>-<br />
suring OB WEST that “the number of<br />
units originally projected will be made<br />
available.” This w<strong>as</strong> on 27 November.<br />
The initial target date for Wacht am<br />
Rhein had come and gone; the Allied<br />
November offensive had been a spoiling<br />
attack in the true sense of the term,<br />
albeit unwittingly so.<br />
The German attack in the west<br />
launched on 10 May 1940, in so many<br />
respects the prototype for the 1944 coun-<br />
teroffensive in the Ardennes, had been<br />
postponed some sixteen times. 1 The<br />
period of planning and preparation had<br />
covered six and a half months. In 1939–<br />
40, however, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no pressing rea-<br />
son to disturb the quiet of the “phony<br />
war,” nor w<strong>as</strong> the Third Reich seriously<br />
threatened on the ground or in the air.<br />
The summer dis<strong>as</strong>ters in 1944, on the<br />
contrary, demanded immediate action to<br />
recoup German losses and stave off an<br />
immediate threat. T<strong>here</strong> is no question<br />
that Hitler’s selection of the target date<br />
for the start of the offensive, 25 Novem-<br />
ber 1944, w<strong>as</strong> made with every intention<br />
that the operation should begin in fact<br />
before the end of November. Further-<br />
more, Rundstedt and Model had ac-<br />
cepted this date without official question,<br />
despite the fact that it would leave them<br />
only one month in which to make ready.<br />
Rundstedt, however, had added a cau-<br />
tionary note by reminding OKW that the<br />
actual attack date would depend upon<br />
the arrival of the panzer divisions in<br />
their forward <strong>as</strong>sembly positions and the<br />
completion of ammunition and fuel<br />
stockpiling in the concentration area.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is some evidence that the<br />
Fuehrer had chosen November not only<br />
for its promise of poor flying weather<br />
but also because he hoped to win a vic-<br />
tory in the west and rele<strong>as</strong>e divisions to<br />
the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front before the beginning<br />
of the annual Soviet winter offensive. If<br />
so, this second desideratum w<strong>as</strong> not con-<br />
sidered of really vital importance <strong>as</strong><br />
planning progressed. The operation di-<br />
rective of 10 November in which Hitler<br />
ordered that the concentration period be<br />
ended by the 27th clearly referred to<br />
1 The numerous postponements of the German<br />
1940 offensive in the west were, for the most<br />
part, the result of Hitler’s injunction that the<br />
attack be made in good flying weather.
TROOPS AND TERRAIN 39<br />
the weather and even included provisions<br />
for a stop-order to arrest the concentra-<br />
tion in midflight should the weather<br />
suddenly turn fair. The concentration<br />
for Wacht am Rhein, already in progress<br />
when the U.S. Third <strong>Army</strong> reopened<br />
large-scale fighting on the Western<br />
Front, continued at a wobbly pace dur-<br />
ing the second and third weeks of No-<br />
vember. Eventually the impossibility of<br />
relieving the attack divisions <strong>as</strong> sched-<br />
uled and the delays wrought by the<br />
temporary commitment of units like the<br />
Panzer Lehr became so obvious <strong>as</strong> to<br />
brook no denial-even by Hitler. His<br />
postponement of the attack cannot be<br />
pinpointed, but the word probably came<br />
sometime after 23 November. On that<br />
date Model reported that of the armor<br />
slated for Wacht am Rhein only the four<br />
SS panzer divisions and the 2d Panzer<br />
Division had escaped premature com-<br />
mitment in the battles then raging. In<br />
Model's opinion—mark the date—the<br />
other divisions could not be readied be-<br />
fore 15 December.<br />
The Terrain<br />
The area through which Hitler chose<br />
to launch his counteroffensive w<strong>as</strong>, with<br />
the exception of the Vosges, the most<br />
difficult terrain on the entire line of the<br />
Western Front. It consists of two major<br />
parts, the Eifel and the Ardennes. Al-<br />
though the whole is strewn with the<br />
relics of c<strong>as</strong>tles and fortified churches,<br />
t<strong>here</strong> had been little military history en-<br />
acted within this area before 1914. 2 A<br />
2 The older military history of the Ardennes is<br />
narrated on a somewhat antiquarian b<strong>as</strong>is in Revue<br />
Historique de l’Armée, 1955, II Année, Numéro 2.<br />
For the 1940 campaign see L. Menu, Lurnière Sur<br />
Les Ruines, Paris, 1953; also M. Fouillien and J.<br />
straight line between Paris and Berlin<br />
will bisect the Eifel and Ardennes, but<br />
the movement of armies during the cen-<br />
turies normally had followed the e<strong>as</strong>ier<br />
roads going around this area: in the<br />
north via Liège-Maubeuge or the Flan-<br />
ders plains, in the south via the Metz<br />
gateway. On occ<strong>as</strong>ion the Ardennes and<br />
Eifel had been used by large forces for<br />
movement without fighting, battle being<br />
joined at the natural defense lines of<br />
the Meuse River west of the Ardennes,<br />
or the Rhine River e<strong>as</strong>t of the Eifel.<br />
In 1914, <strong>as</strong> part of the Schlieffen Plan,<br />
three of the Imperial German armies<br />
marched from the Eifel through the<br />
Ardennes. Schlieffen had predicted that<br />
the French would react to the pressure<br />
of the heavy German right wing <strong>as</strong> it<br />
swung through northern Belgium by<br />
counterattacking into the flank via south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern Belgium. It w<strong>as</strong> an integral part<br />
of the famous plan, t<strong>here</strong>fore, that the<br />
German right wing would be covered by<br />
an extension through southern Belgium<br />
and Luxembourg, and that the Ardennes<br />
m<strong>as</strong>sif would be used, if needed, <strong>as</strong> a<br />
b<strong>as</strong>tion from which the French flanking<br />
attack would be repelled. A portion of<br />
the Second and all of the Third and<br />
Fourth German Armies did advance<br />
through southern Belgium and Luxem-<br />
bourg, the march through the main por-<br />
tion of the Ardennes being covered by<br />
the rapid movement of Richthofen's I<br />
Cavalry Corps. French reaction w<strong>as</strong> slow<br />
and the tiny Belgian <strong>Army</strong> had been<br />
drawn away to defend Liège and Brus-<br />
sels. As a result the Germans marched<br />
across the main body of the Ardennes<br />
m<strong>as</strong>s without a fight, the ultimate meet-<br />
ing engagements with the French on 22<br />
Bouhon, Mai 1940: La Bataille de Belgique,<br />
Bruxelles, n.d.
40 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
August taking place in the densely<br />
wooded but less rugged segment of the<br />
Ardennes (sometimes called the Forest<br />
of Ardennes) close to the Belgian-French<br />
border in the neighborhood of Neufchâ<br />
teau and Virton.<br />
In 1940 the Ardennes once again w<strong>as</strong><br />
invaded and crossed by German troops,<br />
the jangle of Richthofen’s squadrons<br />
giving way to the roar and grind of<br />
Kleist’s tanks. This time, at Hitler’s in-<br />
sistence, the German maneuver departed<br />
from the cl<strong>as</strong>sic concept of Schlieffen,<br />
the weight of the German attack being<br />
thrown south of Liège rather than north,<br />
while a narrow thrust replaced the blud-<br />
geon strokes of a m<strong>as</strong>sive wheeling<br />
movement. This main effort toward a<br />
decisive breakthrough w<strong>as</strong> launched<br />
through a narrow corridor marked ap-<br />
proximately by B<strong>as</strong>togne in the north<br />
and Arlon in the south; but the bulk of<br />
three German armies debouched from<br />
the Eifel and marched across the Ar-<br />
dennes. As in 1914 the crossing of the<br />
Ardennes m<strong>as</strong>sif w<strong>as</strong> little more than a<br />
route march, impeded ever so slightly<br />
by brave but tragic and futile attempts<br />
at resistance by the Belgian Ch<strong>as</strong>seurs<br />
Ardennais. Without detracting from the<br />
courage of these few Belgians it is fair to<br />
say that the Germans did not have to<br />
fight before they reached the Meuse<br />
River, and even t<strong>here</strong> they experienced<br />
little opposition. The German advance<br />
through southern Belgium and Luxem-<br />
bourg in 1914 had demonstrated that a<br />
huge modern force could be concen-<br />
trated via rail in the abrupt, broken<br />
country of the Eifel, and from thence be<br />
moved afoot or ahorse through the worst<br />
of the Ardennes m<strong>as</strong>s.<br />
The events of 1940 proved that mecha-<br />
nized forces could move speedily<br />
through the Ardennes, and more, that<br />
not only w<strong>as</strong> Hitler correct in his insist-<br />
ence on the use of large mechanized<br />
forces in the Ardennes, but that the pro-<br />
fessionals in OKH who had opposed him<br />
were wrong. In 1944, <strong>as</strong> a result, it w<strong>as</strong><br />
known that the terrain in the Eifel and<br />
Ardennes w<strong>as</strong> not so bad but what it<br />
could be quickly negotiated by modern<br />
mechanized armies under conditions of<br />
good weather and little or no enemy re-<br />
sistance. What history could not demon-<br />
strate, for the lessons were lacking, w<strong>as</strong><br />
whether modern, mechanized armies<br />
could attack through the Ardennes and<br />
speedily overcome a combination of<br />
stubborn enemy defense, difficult<br />
ground, and poor weather. Terrain,<br />
then, would play a peculiarly important<br />
role in the development of the 1944<br />
counteroffensive.<br />
Although the Ardennes h<strong>as</strong> given its<br />
name to the campaign under study, this<br />
area should be lumped with that of the<br />
Eifel, the composite of the tablelands to<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t which sheltered the German<br />
concentration during the late autumn of<br />
1944. These two are<strong>as</strong> are extensions of<br />
the Westerwald, blending almost insensi-<br />
bly into each other and sharing many of<br />
the same characteristics. The Eifel is the<br />
complex of hill ranges–they can hardly<br />
be called mountains–lying between the<br />
Rhine, the Moselle, and the Roer Rivers,<br />
mostly in Germany. Only the two west-<br />
ernmost of the Eifel highlands or ranges<br />
need be mentioned <strong>here</strong>. E<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith<br />
and just inside the German border is<br />
the Schnee Eifel, a high tree-covered<br />
ridge or hogback. It extends from the<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t to the southwest, a character-<br />
istic thrust line in the entire area, and in<br />
1944 w<strong>as</strong> crested on much of its length<br />
by the West Wall fortifications. E<strong>as</strong>t of
NOVILLE<br />
AND STOLZEMBG. <strong>To</strong>wns in the Ardennes are small and usually fall into one<br />
of two types: a cluster of houses at a crossroads, such <strong>as</strong> Noville (above), and a river valley<br />
settlement, such <strong>as</strong> Stolzemburg on the Our ('below).
42 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Liège is the Hohes Venn, a long table-<br />
land topped with lakes and marshes. The<br />
Hohes Venn is larger than the Schnee<br />
Eifel. Its northe<strong>as</strong>t-southwest course is<br />
defined by a line through Malmédy and<br />
Monschau on the German face and by a<br />
line through Eupen and Spa on the Bel-<br />
gian. In the northe<strong>as</strong>t the Hohes Venn<br />
is prolonged by the Hürtgen Forest. As<br />
the Schnee Eifel forms a barrier covering<br />
St. Vith on the e<strong>as</strong>t, so the Hohes Venn<br />
is a large outer b<strong>as</strong>tion for Liege. Al-<br />
though the Hohes Venn is geologically<br />
a part of the Eifel it is somewhat re-<br />
moved from the other parts of the<br />
complex and represents the gradual and<br />
sometimes indefinable blending of the<br />
Eifel and Ardennes.<br />
The Eifel is thickly covered with<br />
forests and provides good cover from air<br />
observation even in the fall and winter.<br />
The area h<strong>as</strong> no large towns but rather<br />
is marked by numerous small villages,<br />
requiring extensive dispersion for any<br />
large forces billeted <strong>here</strong>. The road net<br />
is adequate for a large military concen-<br />
tration. The rail net is extensive, having<br />
been engineered and expanded before<br />
1914 for the quick deployment of troops<br />
west of the Rhine. The railroads feed<br />
into the Eifel from Koblenz, Cologne,<br />
and the lesser Rhine bridgeheads be-<br />
tween these two. The main rail line, how-<br />
ever, does not cross the Eifel but follows<br />
the Moselle valley on the southern<br />
fringe of the Eifel. Rail and road sys-<br />
tems throughout the Eifel are marked by<br />
meandering courses and numerous<br />
bridge crossings thrown over rivers and<br />
deep ravines.<br />
The Ardennes, like the Eifel, is not a<br />
single and well-defined bloc. The general<br />
area may be defined <strong>as</strong> a wedge with the<br />
point between Aachen and Düren. The<br />
northern edge is a diagonal: Aachen,<br />
Liege, Maubeuge, Landrecis. The south-<br />
ern edge (much debated by geologists)<br />
is a more pronounced diagonal running<br />
from Aachen southwest to Arlon. The<br />
b<strong>as</strong>e, formed by the Forêt des Ardennes<br />
or French Ardennes, roughly coincides<br />
with the Franco-Belgian frontier and the<br />
Semois River. The Ardennes h<strong>as</strong> three<br />
recognized subdepartments: the High<br />
Ardennes in the south, the Famenne De-<br />
pression in the middle, and the Low<br />
Ardennes in the north. The Low Ar-<br />
dennes tends to be open and rolling, but<br />
includes two plateaus: that of Herve, be-<br />
tween Liège and Aachen, and Condroz,<br />
between the lower Ourthe and the<br />
Meuse in the vicinity of Dinant. This<br />
sector is more readily traversed than is<br />
the High Ardennes, but it is relatively<br />
narrow, maneuver is constricted by<br />
the flanking line of the Meuse River, and<br />
entrance from the e<strong>as</strong>t presupposes that<br />
the invader h<strong>as</strong> possession of Aachen and<br />
the roads circling north or south of the<br />
Hohes Venn.<br />
The Famenne Depression is only a<br />
thin sliver of the Ardennes wedge. The<br />
Famenne is free from tree cover except<br />
for the characteristic ,buttes which dot<br />
the depression. Scooped out of the Ar-<br />
dennes m<strong>as</strong>sif, this long, narrow depres-<br />
sion originates at the upper Ourthe and<br />
extends westward through Marche and<br />
Rochefort. It reaches the Meuse between<br />
Givet and Dinant, offering a good cross-<br />
ing site which often h<strong>as</strong> been employed<br />
by European armies operating on the<br />
Meuse. But an invader from the German<br />
frontier must traverse much difficult<br />
terrain before debouching into this<br />
“march through” depression.<br />
The High Ardennes is often called<br />
the “True Ardennes.” It is not properly
TROOPS AND TERRAIN 43<br />
mountainous, nor yet a forest; rather it<br />
is a wide plateau or high plain out of<br />
which rise elevations in the form of<br />
ridges or higher plateaus erupting from<br />
the main m<strong>as</strong>s. These elevations gener-<br />
ally are unrelated to one another and<br />
combine with large forests to form iso-<br />
lated and independent compartments in<br />
which tactical domination of one hill<br />
m<strong>as</strong>s seldom provides domination of an-<br />
other. The m<strong>as</strong>s structure extends on a<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t-southwest axis, forming a<br />
watershed which drains away to the<br />
Meuse in the north and the Moselle in<br />
the southe<strong>as</strong>t. Perhaps a third of the area<br />
is covered with forest, much of which is<br />
coniferous. This timber, however, is<br />
scattered all over the High Ardennes<br />
and presents a patchwork picture rather<br />
than a series of large forested preserves.<br />
The main m<strong>as</strong>s is cut in zigzag patterns<br />
by winding, deeply eroded rivers and<br />
streams, some flowing parallel to the<br />
higher ridges, others crossing so <strong>as</strong> to<br />
chop the ridges and the welts on the pla-<br />
teau into separate sections. In some<br />
places the watercourses run through nar-<br />
row, almost canyonlike depressions with<br />
steep walls rising from a hundred to<br />
three hundred feet. Even the wider<br />
valleys are narrow when compared with<br />
the western European norm.<br />
The road net in 1944 w<strong>as</strong> far richer<br />
than the population and the economic<br />
activity of the Ardennes would seem to<br />
warrant. This w<strong>as</strong> not the result of mili-<br />
tary planning, <strong>as</strong> in the c<strong>as</strong>e of the Eifel<br />
rail lines, but rather of Belgian and<br />
Luxemburgian recognition of the value<br />
of automobile tourisme just prior to<br />
World War II. All of the main roads had<br />
hard surfaces, generally of macadam. Al-<br />
though the road builders tried to follow<br />
the more level stretches of the ridge<br />
lines or wider valley floors, in many c<strong>as</strong>es<br />
the roads twisted sharply and turned on<br />
steep grades down into a deep ravine<br />
and out again on the opposite side. The<br />
bridges were normally built of stone.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> were ten all-weather roads cross-<br />
ing from the German frontier into Bel-<br />
gium and Luxembourg in the sector be-<br />
tween Monschau and W<strong>as</strong>serbillig, but<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> not a single main highway<br />
traversing the Ardennes in a straight<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t-west direction.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> are no cities in the Ardennes,<br />
unless the capital of Luxembourg and<br />
Arlon are included in this area. The larg-<br />
est villages had, in 1944, populations of<br />
2,500 to 4,000. The normal settlement in<br />
the Ardennes w<strong>as</strong> the small village with<br />
stone houses and very narrow, winding<br />
streets. These villages often constricted<br />
the through road to single-lane traffic.<br />
Another military feature w<strong>as</strong> the lone<br />
farmstead or inn which gave its name to<br />
the crossroads at which it stood.<br />
The fact that most of the High Ar-<br />
dennes lies inside Belgium leads to some<br />
confusion, since one of the administra-<br />
tive subdivisions of that kingdom is<br />
named “Ardennes” but is not exactly<br />
conterminous with the geographical<br />
area. Luxembourg, into which the Ar-<br />
dennes extends, is divided in two parts,<br />
roughly along a line from Attert on the<br />
west to a point midway between<br />
Vianden and Diekirch on the e<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
boundary. The northern half generally<br />
is considered an extension of the High<br />
Ardennes (although one may find <strong>as</strong><br />
many definitions of the south edge of the<br />
Ardennes <strong>as</strong> t<strong>here</strong> are writers touching<br />
the subject) ; in any c<strong>as</strong>e it shares the<br />
same physical properties. The southern<br />
half of Luxembourg, known appropri-<br />
ately <strong>as</strong> the “Good Land,” is less high,
44 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
h<strong>as</strong> more open space, and its valleys<br />
normally can be traveled. A single<br />
river, the Alzette, bisects this part of<br />
Luxembourg in a north-south course<br />
which takes it through the capital city.<br />
But the e<strong>as</strong>tern approach to the Good<br />
Land er<strong>as</strong>es much of its military attrac-<br />
tiveness. Between Sierck and W<strong>as</strong>ser-<br />
billig the Moselle River forms the<br />
boundary between Luxembourg and<br />
Germany. In this sector the left or Lux-<br />
embourg bank of the river is especially<br />
difficult even by comparison with the<br />
normal terrain obstacles encountered in<br />
the High Ardennes. Farther north,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> the Sauer River continues the<br />
boundary, the river valley is somewhat<br />
less formidable but is backed up by a<br />
broken, gorge-riven area in the neighbor-<br />
hood of Echternach known <strong>as</strong> the “Lux-<br />
embourg Switzerland.”<br />
It is natural, with the Ardennes m<strong>as</strong>s<br />
forming a northe<strong>as</strong>t-southwest divide be-<br />
tween the tributaries of the Meuse and<br />
the Moselle and with rugged geological<br />
patterns twisting and turning these tribu-<br />
taries, that the military hydrography of<br />
the Ardennes should be important. The<br />
prolongation of the Ardennes in north-<br />
ern Luxembourg is dissected by four<br />
rivers. On the e<strong>as</strong>tern frontier the Our<br />
River continues the boundary trace be-<br />
gun by the Moselle and the Sauer. In<br />
the interior the Wiltz, the Clerf, and the<br />
Sure divide the country into water-<br />
bound compartments. Their valleys are<br />
long and narrow, so narrow and tortuous<br />
that they cannot be followed by roads.<br />
They are further complicated by “cups”<br />
scoured out of the side walls and by cross<br />
ravines, deep and narrow.<br />
In the Ardennes north of Luxembourg<br />
it is possible to cross from Germany into<br />
Belgium without traversing a major<br />
stream. About twenty miles west of the<br />
frontier, however, comes the first of the<br />
rivers descending from the High Ar-<br />
dennes into the Meuse; these are the<br />
Amblève and the Salm which serve <strong>as</strong><br />
flankers for the swamp-encrusted table-<br />
land of the Hohes Venn and must be<br />
crossed in any movement west from St.<br />
Vith, Malmédy, or Spa. Next comes the<br />
longest of these rivers, the Ourthe,<br />
which is the most severe military ob-<br />
stacle e<strong>as</strong>t of the Meuse. It originates<br />
west of B<strong>as</strong>togne <strong>as</strong> a small creek, then<br />
meanders north until it meets the Meuse<br />
at Liège. At Ortheuville the Ourthe be-<br />
gins to cut through a narrow and wind-<br />
ing defile with steep, rocky sides fringed<br />
by pine trees. Just north of La Roche<br />
the Ourthe leaves its tortuous canyons<br />
and enters the Famenne Depression.<br />
That part of the course between Ortheu-<br />
ville and La Roche permits no road ad-<br />
jacent to the river bed; all approaches to<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t-west crossing sites are difficult.<br />
Just e<strong>as</strong>t of the defile through which<br />
flows the middle Ourthe lies the Plateau<br />
des Tailles, which rises to over 1,800 feet<br />
at the Baraque de Fraiture. Two<br />
rivers are found between the Ourthe<br />
and the Meuse: the Lesse and L’Homme<br />
whose confluence is near Rochefort.<br />
Neither of these rivers is too difficult of<br />
negotiation, but the main westward<br />
crossing for movement toward Dinant<br />
and the Meuse centers at Rochefort.<br />
At the very edge of the Ardennes in the<br />
southwest is the Semois River, which<br />
wends its way westward from Arlon to<br />
the Meuse. The Semois is deeply sunk<br />
through much of its course, flowing be-<br />
tween steep walls which descend directly<br />
to the water’s edge and so deny space<br />
for road or rail on the valley bottom.<br />
Although the rivers of the Eifel, <strong>as</strong> dis-
TROOPS AND TERRAIN 45<br />
tinct from those of the Ardennes, would<br />
have no tactical significance in the battle<br />
of the Ardennes, they were to be of<br />
very considerable logistic, or what the<br />
Germans style “operational,” impor-<br />
tance. The northernmost, the Ahr, fol-<br />
lows an oblique course northe<strong>as</strong>t until it<br />
enters the Rhine at Sinzig. From the<br />
Schnee Eifel comes the Kyll, bending<br />
southward to meet the Moselle not far<br />
from Trier. Paralleling the Kyll in the<br />
west is the Prüm River. It is the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
stream of any importance before the Ger-<br />
man frontier is reached. Like the Kyll<br />
its sources are in the heights of the<br />
Schnee Eifel. The beautiful Moselle at-<br />
tracts numerous small tributaries rush-<br />
ing down from the Eifel, but only the<br />
Moselle itself deserves attention. Alter-<br />
nating between scenes of towering rocks<br />
and meadow p<strong>as</strong>sages, the German<br />
Moselle winds and turns capriciously<br />
from its entrance on German soil, p<strong>as</strong>t<br />
Trier and a host of little villages whose<br />
names are known to all lovers of the<br />
vine, until finally it rushes p<strong>as</strong>t the<br />
“German Corner” at Koblenz and into<br />
the Rhine. Just <strong>as</strong> the Moselle vineyards<br />
of renown alternate from one bank to<br />
the other, so the railroad line and the<br />
highway crisscross the river throughout<br />
its middle reaches; but rail and road<br />
come to a focal point only a few kilome-<br />
ters from the Luxembourg frontier at<br />
the old Roman city of Trier.<br />
Throughout this whole area military<br />
routes of movement, regardless of the<br />
weather, are synonymous with the road<br />
system. The roads of the Ardennes pro-<br />
liferate in accordance with the geological<br />
compartments incised in the high pla-<br />
teau by rivers and streams <strong>as</strong> they recede<br />
downward. The main roads tend to fol-<br />
low a north-south axis, although one,<br />
from Luxembourg to Namur, cuts across<br />
the grain of the main m<strong>as</strong>s in a south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t-northwest direction. In the north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t the chief road centers are Monschau,<br />
Malmédy, and St. Vith. The southe<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
ern nodal points are Ettelbruck, Mersch,<br />
and, of course, Luxembourg. <strong>To</strong> the<br />
northwest B<strong>as</strong>togne, Marche, and Roche-<br />
fort are the paramount links in the road<br />
system. Arlon, Neufchâteau, and Libra-<br />
mont, in the southwest, complete this<br />
picture. The Eifel is rimmed by a main<br />
road system which hugs the west bank of<br />
the Rhine between Bonn and Koblenz,<br />
then follows the Moselle River until it<br />
breaks away cross-country via Wittlich<br />
to reach Trier. The circuit is completed<br />
by a road which goes north from Trier<br />
through Bitburg, Prüm, and Euskirchen,<br />
finally bifurcating to reach the Rhine at<br />
Bonn and at Cologne. Inside of this cir-<br />
cuit the chief communications centers<br />
are Mayen, Daun, Kochem, and, at-<br />
tached to the outer ring, Wittlich.<br />
The character of the Eifel-Ardennes<br />
terrain dictates three major b<strong>as</strong>es of op-<br />
erations for an attack from the German<br />
frontier. In the north the Aachen sector<br />
is one such b<strong>as</strong>e. The direction of attack<br />
<strong>here</strong> would be through the Low Ar-<br />
dennes via Eupen, Verviers, Marche, and<br />
Rochefort to the Meuse at Givet. The<br />
next b<strong>as</strong>e, to the south, lies between<br />
Monschau and the Losheim Gap. The<br />
westward thrust from this b<strong>as</strong>e must go<br />
over and between Malmédy and St. Vith.<br />
The broadest b<strong>as</strong>e of operations is in the<br />
south between Prüm and Trier. In this<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e the attack must be made against the<br />
grain of the Ardennes m<strong>as</strong>s except for a<br />
penetration from Trier to the French<br />
frontier at Virton or Longwy which may<br />
byp<strong>as</strong>s the more rugged country to the<br />
north by movement through the Good
46 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Land of southern Luxembourg. This<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t route, however, is by far the longest<br />
for any attack aimed at reaching the<br />
Meuse River.<br />
The geography of the Ardennes leads<br />
inevitably to the channelization of large<br />
troop movements e<strong>as</strong>t to west, will tend<br />
to force larger units to “pile up” on each<br />
other, and restricts freedom of maneuver<br />
once the direction of attack and order of<br />
battle are fixed. <strong>To</strong> a marked degree the<br />
military problem posed by the terrain is<br />
that of movement control rather than<br />
maneuver in the cl<strong>as</strong>sic sense. For the<br />
smaller tactical units, the chopped-up<br />
nature of the ground plus the peculiar<br />
timber formations in which dense wood<br />
lots are interspersed with natural or man-<br />
made clearings, indicates the develop-<br />
ment of a series of small, semi-indepen-<br />
dent engagements once the larger battle<br />
is joined. Movement cross-country is<br />
limited, even in good weather; move-<br />
ment along the narrow valley floors may<br />
be blocked t<strong>here</strong> or in the villages at<br />
points of descent and <strong>as</strong>cent. The back-<br />
bone of the ridges sometimes offers good<br />
observation in the immediate area for<br />
detecting movement on the roads which<br />
climb the hills and plateaus. Locally,<br />
however, the gunner or fighter pilot will<br />
find many blind spots formed by the<br />
thick tree cover or the deep draws and<br />
ravines; the ability of high-angle fire to<br />
beat reverse slopes, which really are<br />
sheer, steep walls, is limited.<br />
What the German planners saw in<br />
1944 w<strong>as</strong> this: the Ardennes could be<br />
traversed by large forces even when<br />
these were heavily mechanized. An at-<br />
tack from e<strong>as</strong>t to west across the m<strong>as</strong>sif<br />
would encounter initially the greatest<br />
obstacles of terrain, but these obstacles<br />
would decre<strong>as</strong>e in number <strong>as</strong> an advance<br />
neared the Meuse. In 1914 and 1940 the<br />
German armies moving across the Ar-<br />
dennes had no re<strong>as</strong>on to anticipate strong<br />
opposition on the ground until the<br />
Meuse had been reached and the tortu-<br />
ous defiles left behind. In 1940 the only<br />
German concern had been that the<br />
French air force would catch the ar-<br />
mored columns at the crossings of the<br />
Sauer and Our Rivers. In both these<br />
earlier campaigns the Germans had<br />
thrown a protective screen clear to the<br />
Meuse within twenty-four hours after<br />
the advance began; the initial objectives<br />
of these screening movements have more<br />
than historic significance: B<strong>as</strong>togne, St.<br />
Vith, Arlon, Malmédy, La Roche, and<br />
the bridges over the Ourthe River.<br />
The ground offered the defender<br />
three natural defense positions e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
the Meuse, although none of these con-<br />
stituted an imp<strong>as</strong>sable barrier to the at-<br />
tacker: (1) a covering line echeloned<br />
to the southe<strong>as</strong>t between Liège and the<br />
Moselle, this pegged on the Hohes Venn,<br />
the rugged zone around Malmédy and<br />
St. Vith, and the boxed-in course of the<br />
Our and Sauer Rivers; (2) the Ourthe<br />
River line; and (3) an intermediate po-<br />
sition, shorter in length, b<strong>as</strong>ed on the<br />
plateau at B<strong>as</strong>togne and extending along<br />
a chain of ridges to Neufchâteau.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remains a word to be said about<br />
the climate of the Ardennes and Eifel.<br />
This is mountainous country, with much<br />
rainfall, deep snows in winter, and raw,<br />
harsh winds sweeping across the plateaus.<br />
The heaviest rains come in November<br />
and December. The mists are frequent<br />
and heavy, l<strong>as</strong>ting well into late morning<br />
before they break. Precise predictions by<br />
the military meteorologist, however,<br />
are difficult because the Ardennes lies<br />
directly on the boundary between the
TROOPS AND TERRAIN 47<br />
northwestern and central European climatic<br />
regions and thus is affected by the<br />
conjuncture of weather moving e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
from the British Isles and the Atlantic<br />
with that moving westward out of Russia.<br />
At Stavelot freezing weather averages<br />
112 days a year, at B<strong>as</strong>togne 145 days.<br />
The structure of the soil will permit<br />
tank movement when the ground is<br />
frozen, but turns readily to a clayey mire<br />
in time of rain. Snowfall often attains a<br />
depth of ten to twelve inches in a 24-hour<br />
period. Snow lingers for a long time in<br />
the Ardennes but-and this is important<br />
in recounting the events of 1944–the<br />
deep snows come late. 3<br />
3 The best of numerous terrain descriptions of<br />
the Ardennes w<strong>as</strong> prepared by the German General<br />
Staff in 1940, especially for the offensive in the west.<br />
It is entitled Mililaergeographischer ueberblick<br />
ueber Belgien und angrenzende Gebiete. See also<br />
the British official publication of 1918: A Manual<br />
of Belgium and the Adjoining Territories (ed.<br />
The Admiralty). The best analysis of German<br />
military thought on the problem presented by<br />
the Ardennes terrain is in a manuscript by Magna<br />
E. Bauer entitled Comparison Between the Plan-<br />
ning for the German Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive in 1944<br />
and for the Campaign in the West in 1940 (1951).<br />
OCMH.
Deception and Camouflage<br />
Hitler’s selection of the Ardennes <strong>as</strong><br />
the sector in which the western counter-<br />
offensive would be launched w<strong>as</strong> b<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
in the main on the obvious advantage of<br />
attacking the Allies w<strong>here</strong> they were<br />
weakest. Even so, although the Western<br />
Allies could not be strong everyw<strong>here</strong><br />
along the line from Switzerland to the<br />
North Sea, they did outnumber the<br />
Germans in men, tanks, guns, and planes,<br />
they were possessed of greater facility for<br />
rapid movement of large forces, and<br />
they–not the Germans–had the stra-<br />
tegic initiative. At the first word of<br />
German preparations in the Eifel and<br />
Ardennes the Allies could terminate one<br />
or both of their major offensives and<br />
divert large forces into the threatened<br />
area.<br />
The accepted strategic gambit, prac-<br />
ticed with great success by German com-<br />
manders in the west during World War<br />
I, would be to deliver a series of large-<br />
scale attacks in sectors well removed<br />
from the area from which the main<br />
counteroffensive w<strong>as</strong> to be launched. But<br />
the divisions and the logistic support for<br />
such diversionary attacks did not exist.<br />
The German armies in the west could<br />
not uncover the enemy’s jaw by a blow<br />
in Holland or a kidney punch in Alsace;<br />
instead they had to rely on the adroit<br />
misdirection practiced by the conjuror,<br />
turning Allied eyes away from the Eifel<br />
CHAPTER IV<br />
Preparations<br />
long enough to complete the m<strong>as</strong>sive<br />
preparations t<strong>here</strong>in.<br />
The German military profession had<br />
a record of some notable achievements in<br />
the attainment of strategic surprise. The<br />
Ludendorff March offensive in 1918 had<br />
been a brilliant example–indeed a<br />
model–of a great offensive whose prepa-<br />
ration had completely escaped detection.<br />
The meticulous detail employed by<br />
Ludendorff’s planners had achieved such<br />
success that the 1918 plans for the cover<br />
and movement of artillery simply were<br />
copied in the artillery build-up for the<br />
Ardennes. The German offensive in<br />
1940 likewise had been a marked ex-<br />
ample of strategic surprise, despite the<br />
forced landing on Belgian soil of a<br />
German plane carrying two liaison offi-<br />
cers who had been entrusted with the<br />
attack plan. The chief security tenets<br />
adopted in preparation for the 1940 at-<br />
tack had been personally dictated by<br />
Hitler, and the first formal security<br />
order issued by OKW in preparation for<br />
the Ardennes counteroffensive w<strong>as</strong> a re-<br />
statement of the Fuehrer Directive of 11<br />
January 1940. (This time, however, liai-<br />
son officers party to the plan were ex-<br />
pressly forbidden to travel by plane.)<br />
Subsequent security me<strong>as</strong>ures would re-<br />
flect or rephr<strong>as</strong>e those which had been<br />
so successful in 1940. 1<br />
Probably the Fuehrer’s personal influ-<br />
1 Bauer, Planning for German Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fen-<br />
sive in 1944 . . . and 1940, app. 8.
PREPARATIONS 49<br />
ence w<strong>as</strong> felt most directly in limiting<br />
the circle of those privy to the plan<br />
during its conception and initial imple-<br />
mentation. Hitler, the highest authority<br />
in the German armed forces, personally<br />
named the officers who were to be ad-<br />
mitted to the great secret; furthermore,<br />
he possessed the power to exact the<br />
death penalty for violations of security,<br />
a power he could be expected to exer-<br />
cise on the slightest provocation and<br />
without regard to the rank or prestige of<br />
the offender. Even the well-disciplined,<br />
high-ranking officers of the Wehrmacht<br />
seem to have been apprehensive of the<br />
personal risks which each encountered<br />
the moment he w<strong>as</strong> admitted to the plan.<br />
So strict w<strong>as</strong> the limitation of knowledge<br />
that in those headquarters charged with<br />
the command of the counteroffensive,<br />
OB WEST and <strong>Army</strong> Group B, the only<br />
officers brought into the planning ph<strong>as</strong>e<br />
were Rundstedt and Model, plus the<br />
chief of staff, the G–3, the quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter<br />
officer, and one aide in each of their<br />
respective staffs. In OB WEST, for ex-<br />
ample, the daily and most secret war<br />
diary contained no reference to the<br />
counteroffensive; instead a separate war<br />
diary w<strong>as</strong> maintained, without benefit of<br />
secretary or stenographer, by the few<br />
officers working on the plan. The ex-<br />
change of information between the re-<br />
sponsible headquarters w<strong>as</strong> carried by<br />
liaison officers whose every movement<br />
w<strong>as</strong> watched by military and Gestapo<br />
security agents. All teletype and tele-<br />
phone lines were monitored the clock<br />
around and the officers in the know were<br />
so informed. Hitler had a mania for<br />
“oaths.” Everyone admitted to the plan<br />
took not one but ofttimes several oaths<br />
to maintain secrecy, signing at le<strong>as</strong>t one<br />
statement which accepted the death<br />
penalty for any personal breach of<br />
security. Later, division and corps commanders<br />
would be compelled to take an<br />
oath that during the advance they would<br />
not tresp<strong>as</strong>s in the attack zone <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
neighboring units. The death penalty<br />
attached to this <strong>as</strong> well. 2<br />
Although the immediate planning<br />
staffs could be dr<strong>as</strong>tically limited, it w<strong>as</strong><br />
obvious that some hundreds of officers<br />
would have to be involved in the actual<br />
handling of troops and supplies during<br />
the concentration period, that is from<br />
about 10 November, when the major re-<br />
shuffling of headquarters and larger<br />
troop units would commence, until the<br />
date selected for the jump-off in the Ar-<br />
dennes. The German system of staff<br />
work, b<strong>as</strong>ed on the rigid allocation of<br />
authority and unquestioning obedience<br />
to orders, w<strong>as</strong> well designed to cope with<br />
this situation. Furthermore, the Allied<br />
attacks in November were launched on<br />
such a scale and achieved such success <strong>as</strong><br />
to give real meaning to the Hitler-in-<br />
spired cover plan, The Defensive Battle<br />
in the West. Until the very l<strong>as</strong>t hours<br />
before the counteroffensive the Western<br />
Front German commanders accepted <strong>as</strong><br />
gospel the idea that the m<strong>as</strong>sing of ma-<br />
tériel and the progressive withdrawal of<br />
divisions from the line w<strong>as</strong> intended to<br />
provide fresh troops for the defense of<br />
the Ruhr and the Palatinate. Indeed the<br />
field commanders were much perplexed<br />
in the l<strong>as</strong>t days before the Ardennes<br />
counteroffensive by re<strong>as</strong>on of what they<br />
regarded <strong>as</strong> the high command’s caprici-<br />
ousness and folly in refusing to throw<br />
its reserves into the defensive battles<br />
2 MS # B–038, 116th Panzer Division, Ardennes<br />
(Generalmajor Siegfried von Waldenburg) .
50 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
then reaching a climax in the Aachen<br />
and Saverne Gap sectors. 3<br />
The cover and deception plan, per-<br />
sonally devised by Hitler, turned on a<br />
half-truth. A part of the strategic con-<br />
centration would be made in the Rheydt-<br />
Jülich-Cologne area e<strong>as</strong>t of Aachen.<br />
Here the preparations for the counter-<br />
offensive would be paraded before the<br />
Allies. <strong>To</strong> the south, at the entry to the<br />
chosen path of attack, the Eifel concen-<br />
tration w<strong>as</strong> to be accomplished under<br />
conditions of greatest secrecy behind the<br />
thin line manned by the weak Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong>. Then, at the l<strong>as</strong>t moment, the<br />
troops from the northern concentration<br />
area would slip south to join the main<br />
build-up in the Eifel. The cover plan,<br />
<strong>as</strong> propagated through the German com-<br />
mands on the Western Front and retailed<br />
to the Allies by neutrals and double-<br />
agents, had this scenario: Germany<br />
feared that the U.S. First and Ninth<br />
Armies would achieve a real break-<br />
through and drive to the Rhine in the<br />
sector between Cologne and Bonn; in<br />
preparation for this untoward event the<br />
Fuehrer w<strong>as</strong> am<strong>as</strong>sing a major counter-<br />
attack force northwest of Cologne; a<br />
secondary and relatively small force of<br />
burned-out divisions w<strong>as</strong> being gat<strong>here</strong>d<br />
in the Eifel to contain the right flank of<br />
the expected Allied penetration. 4<br />
The main actor in this play w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. Ostensibly its head-<br />
quarters remained northwest of Cologne.<br />
Four of the armored divisions actually<br />
<strong>as</strong>signed to this headquarters also <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembled in this area. The intensification<br />
of rail and road traffic which began <strong>here</strong><br />
3 Cole, The Lorraine Campaign, pp. 510–12.<br />
4 The detailed deception scenario is given by<br />
Maj. Percy Schramm, then historian at OKW<br />
headquarters, in MS # A–862.<br />
about mid-November w<strong>as</strong> only partly<br />
concealed. Much movement w<strong>as</strong> made in<br />
daylight. A program of road repair and<br />
civilian evacuation w<strong>as</strong> begun with little<br />
attempt at camouflage. Radio traffic w<strong>as</strong><br />
incre<strong>as</strong>ed commensurate with the troop<br />
concentration. Additional antiaircraft<br />
battalions came into the area and with<br />
them special allotments of ammunition<br />
to produce a thickening of fire which<br />
the Allied air forces could not possibly<br />
fail to notice. <strong>To</strong> emph<strong>as</strong>ize further still<br />
what w<strong>as</strong> transpiring <strong>here</strong> in the north, a<br />
ghost army w<strong>as</strong> brought into being on 20<br />
November; this, the Twenty-fifth, sup-<br />
posedly had an order of battle of ten di-<br />
visions including some of the panzer<br />
divisions which in fact belonged to the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
In contr<strong>as</strong>t to this northern concentra-<br />
tion, that in the Eifel w<strong>as</strong> the product of<br />
secrecy carried to the limit. The Eifel<br />
terrain w<strong>as</strong> well adapted to concealment.<br />
Thick forest cover cloaked its slopes, its<br />
valleys and plateaus. Small villages,<br />
singly not worthy of aerial investigation<br />
but in sum capable of harboring large<br />
forces, offered excellent dispersal. Cani-<br />
ouflage had become second nature with<br />
the German soldier in the west-indeed<br />
since Normandy the art of camouflage<br />
had become the science of survival, and<br />
the Eifel made this t<strong>as</strong>k relatively e<strong>as</strong>y.<br />
Strict traffic regulation confined all rail<br />
movements and road marches to hours<br />
of darkness. Special security detachments<br />
prowled the Eifel, and woe to the com-<br />
mander who allowed a vehicle park to<br />
grow beyond normal size. A radio black-<br />
out w<strong>as</strong> thrown over the concentration<br />
area except for those units actually fac-<br />
ing the enemy in the covering positions.<br />
No artillery registration w<strong>as</strong> permitted<br />
except by guns in the line, and even they
PREPARATIONS 51<br />
were limited to a few rounds per day.<br />
Reconnaissance w<strong>as</strong> confined to a hand-<br />
ful of higher officers; combat patrolling<br />
on the Ardennes front w<strong>as</strong> almost en-<br />
tirely limited to nighttime search for<br />
American patrols.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> were a few potential weaknesses<br />
in the screen thrown around and over<br />
the Eifel. At one time the Allies had<br />
flown night reconnaissance missions<br />
across the Eifel, using flares for photog-<br />
raphy. Even Rundstedt w<strong>as</strong> worried lest<br />
a repetition of these missions disclose the<br />
German secret. Next w<strong>as</strong> the problem<br />
of deserters. A quiet sector, particularly<br />
in an area <strong>as</strong> rugged <strong>as</strong> the Ardennes<br />
and Eifel, offered numerous chances for<br />
a malcontent to slip over to the enemy.<br />
The so-called Volksdeutsch (Alsatians,<br />
Transylvanians, and the like) had the<br />
worst record in this regard; these were<br />
combed out of all forward units and<br />
would not rejoin their outfits until the<br />
battle began. Hitler himself required a<br />
special daily report from OB WEST<br />
listing all known deserters for the 24-<br />
hour period. As it turned out the num-<br />
ber of deserters w<strong>as</strong> surprisingly small,<br />
only five on the Western Front during<br />
the first twelve days of December. 5<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remained the problem of<br />
widening and improving miles of road<br />
in the Eifel without attracting undue<br />
enemy attention. Furthermore the road-<br />
blocks and barriers thrown up <strong>as</strong> part of<br />
the West Wall defenses had to be re-<br />
moved in those sectors w<strong>here</strong> the initial<br />
armored penetration would be made.<br />
Such activity hardly could be concealed.<br />
The answer w<strong>as</strong> to undertake road con-<br />
struction in both the northern and south-<br />
ern are<strong>as</strong> of concentration, tying this to<br />
the cover plan.<br />
5 OB WEST KTB, 13 Dec 44.<br />
German discipline and experience,<br />
backed and enforced by all the security<br />
paraphernalia of a police state, might be<br />
able to divert enemy attention to the<br />
north and prepare a real strategic sur-<br />
prise in the Eifel. In the long run success<br />
or failure would turn on Allied activity<br />
in the air. Could the preparations for<br />
the counteroffensive be completed be-<br />
fore enemy planes spotted the Eifel con-<br />
centration of troops and vehicles?<br />
The Western Front in Early<br />
December<br />
The Allied attacks in November had<br />
<strong>as</strong> their objective the decisive defeat of<br />
the enemy west of the Rhine and the<br />
seizure of a foothold on the e<strong>as</strong>t bank of<br />
that river. By the end of November,<br />
the U.S. First and Ninth Armies, charged<br />
with the main effort, had made some<br />
gains in the direction of Bonn and<br />
Cologne. The 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group, in the<br />
north, had crossed the Waal River, the<br />
left arm of the lower Rhine. The U.S.<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> had put troops on the Saar<br />
River. Farther to the south the U.S.<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> had captured Str<strong>as</strong>bourg<br />
and reached the Rhine. The 1st French<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, on the extreme south flank, mean-<br />
while had liberated Belfort and en-<br />
trapped sizable German forces in the<br />
Colmar pocket. Although Allied losses<br />
had been high, those inflicted on the<br />
enemy had been even greater, probably<br />
on the order of two or three to one. But<br />
the Allies had failed to achieve their<br />
main strategic goals: they had not de-<br />
cisively defeated the German armies<br />
west of the Rhine, nor had they crossed<br />
the river. (Map I)<br />
On 7 December General Dwight D.<br />
Eisenhower, Air Chief Marshal Sir
MAP I<br />
D. Holmes, Jr.
PREPARATIONS 53<br />
Arthur W. Tedder, Field Marshal Sir<br />
Bernard L. Montgomery, and Lt. Gen.<br />
Omar N. Bradley met at Ma<strong>as</strong>tricht to<br />
lay plans for future operations. T<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> general agreement that the Allies<br />
should launch an all-out offensive on the<br />
Western Front early in 1945 but consid-<br />
erable variance between the views of<br />
Eisenhower and Montgomery <strong>as</strong> to the<br />
future scheme of maneuver and disposi-<br />
tion of forces. Montgomery held, <strong>as</strong> he<br />
had since September, for a single strong<br />
thrust across the Rhine north of the<br />
Ruhr and the restriction of all other<br />
operations to containing actions by<br />
limited forces. Eisenhower agreed with<br />
the proposal for a main attack north of<br />
the Ruhr by Montgomery’s 21 <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group and w<strong>as</strong> prepared to give<br />
the field marshal the U.S. Ninth <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
But he w<strong>as</strong> unwilling to abandon his oft-<br />
expressed concept of the one-two punch<br />
with Patton’s Third <strong>Army</strong> swinging a<br />
secondary blow toward the Frankfurt<br />
Gate. 6<br />
After the Ma<strong>as</strong>tricht meeting, Eisen-<br />
hower set plans in motion to continue<br />
pressure on the enemy and chew up <strong>as</strong><br />
many German divisions <strong>as</strong> possible be-<br />
fore the main offensive in the north. <strong>To</strong><br />
accomplish this the Supreme Com-<br />
mander gave permission for the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> to mount an offensive along the<br />
Saar front on 19 December and directed<br />
Lt. Gen. Jacob L. Devers, the 6th <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group commander, to support the drive<br />
with elements of the Seventh <strong>Army</strong>. In<br />
the meantime these two armies contin-<br />
ued heavy local attacks, Patton driving<br />
on Saarlautern while Lt. Gen Alexander<br />
6 Forrest C. Pogue, The Supreme Command, United<br />
States <strong>Army</strong> in World War II (W<strong>as</strong>hington, 1954),<br />
p. 316.<br />
M. Patch’s Seventh <strong>Army</strong> turned north<br />
into the Saverne Gap.<br />
At the opposite end of the long Allied<br />
line, Montgomery gave orders in early<br />
December for the British Second <strong>Army</strong><br />
to “tidy up” the 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group posi-<br />
tion on the Meuse with an attack calcu-<br />
lated to er<strong>as</strong>e the Heinsberg salient. This<br />
operation w<strong>as</strong> flooded out, however, and<br />
on 16 December advance parties were<br />
moving north <strong>as</strong> the first step in a major<br />
shift to the left preparatory to the attack<br />
toward Krefeld and the Ruhr, now<br />
tentatively scheduled for the second<br />
week in January. South of 21 <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group Lt. Gen. William H. Simpson’s<br />
U.S. Ninth <strong>Army</strong> liquidated the remain-<br />
ing enemy forces in the Jülich sector and<br />
by 14 December had closed along the<br />
Roer River. Lt. Gen. Courtney H.<br />
Hodges’ First <strong>Army</strong>, to the right of the<br />
Ninth, also had reached the Roer, after<br />
the bloody Hurtgen battle, but could<br />
not risk a crossing attack while the<br />
Germans held the Urft-Roer dams. A<br />
series of air attacks w<strong>as</strong> launched early<br />
in December to breach the dams and re-<br />
move the threat of enemy-controlled<br />
floods, but with so little success that the<br />
deal p<strong>as</strong>sed to the First <strong>Army</strong>. 7 Bradley<br />
ordered Hodges to seize the Schwam-<br />
menauel and the Urftalsperre, the key<br />
points in the Roer valley system of dams,<br />
and on 13 December the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
commander put the V Corps, his center,<br />
into an attack toward the dams. His<br />
northernmost corps, VII Corps, w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>-<br />
signed a support role in this attack and<br />
would attain its limited objectives by 16<br />
December.<br />
The mission and deployment of Maj.<br />
Gen. Leonard T. Gerow’s V Corps later<br />
7 See MacDonald, The Siegfried Line Campaign,<br />
pp. 597–98.
54<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
GENERAL BRADLEY, AIR CHIEF MARSHAL TEDDER, GENERAL EISENHOWER, AND<br />
FIE MARSHAL MONERY (left to right), during the Ma<strong>as</strong>tricht meeting.<br />
had a direct effect in determining the<br />
initial American reaction to the German<br />
attack. Gerow had four infantry divi-<br />
sions, two armored combat commands,<br />
and a cavalry group at his disposal. A<br />
new division, the 78th, w<strong>as</strong> deployed in<br />
the corps center on a front extending<br />
from Lammersdorf to Monschau. On<br />
the left, the 8th Infantry Division<br />
fronted along the Kyll River line. The<br />
right wing w<strong>as</strong> held by the 99th In-<br />
fantry Division, whose positions reached<br />
from Monschau to the V-VIII Corps<br />
boundary in the Buchholz Forest north-<br />
west of the Losheim Gap. The first<br />
ph<strong>as</strong>e of the V Corps attack w<strong>as</strong> to be<br />
carried by the 78th and 2d Infantry<br />
Divisions, the latter coming up from an<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembly area at Camp Elsenborn and<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sing through the 99th Division left.<br />
The 8th and 99th would confine their<br />
efforts initially to demonstrations and<br />
line-straightening. The first day of the<br />
attack went <strong>as</strong> planned, but on 14 De-<br />
cember the enemy stiffened and on the<br />
15th counterattacked; the 78th Division<br />
became involved in a rough battle at<br />
Rollesbroich and Kesternich, while the<br />
2d bogged down in a slow-moving fight<br />
for individual pillboxes in the Monschau<br />
Forest. This w<strong>as</strong> the situation when the<br />
enemy onslaught hit the 99th Division
PREPARATIONS 55<br />
and its VIII Corps neighbors on the<br />
the morning of 16 December.<br />
GENERAL MIDDLETON<br />
Maj. Gen. Troy H. Middleton’s VIII<br />
Corps on First <strong>Army</strong>’s right flank had no<br />
part in the Allied attacks of early De-<br />
cember. Two of Middleton’s infantry<br />
divisions were weary and c<strong>as</strong>ualty-ridden<br />
from the intense fighting of the Novem-<br />
ber push to the Roer. The third w<strong>as</strong><br />
newly arrived from the United States.<br />
The corps mission, then, w<strong>as</strong> to train,<br />
rest, re-equip, and observe the enemy.<br />
Nonetheless this w<strong>as</strong> no Blighty, a haven<br />
for second-rate troops and bumbling<br />
commanders. The 28th Infantry Division<br />
(Maj. Gen. Norman D. Cota) and the<br />
4th Infantry Division (Maj. Gen. Ray-<br />
mond O. Barton) had distinguished<br />
therhselves in the bloody battles of the<br />
Hurtgen Forest. The veterans of this<br />
fight were well equipped to train and<br />
hearten the replacements for some 9,000<br />
battle c<strong>as</strong>ualties the two divisions had<br />
sustained. General Middleton himself<br />
had a fine combat record reaching from<br />
World War I through Sicily, Normandy,<br />
and Brittany. Deliberate and calm but<br />
tenacious, he w<strong>as</strong> regarded by Bradley<br />
and Patton <strong>as</strong> one of the best tacticians<br />
in the U.S. <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
As the result of the relief of the 83d<br />
Infantry Division, en route to the VII<br />
Corps, the deployment of the VIII Corps<br />
(<strong>as</strong> it would meet the German attack)<br />
took final form on the 13th. The 4th<br />
Infantry Division abutted on the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> at the Luxembourg-French fron-<br />
tier and followed the Moselle and Sauer<br />
Rivers, marking the German border, <strong>as</strong><br />
far north <strong>as</strong> Bollendorf. A combat com-<br />
mand of the 9th Armored Division, <strong>as</strong> yet<br />
inexperienced, had taken over a narrow<br />
sector to the left of the 4th on io De-<br />
cember. The second combat command<br />
of this division, earlier comprising the<br />
corps reserve, w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed to V Corps<br />
and started its march north on 13 De-<br />
cember. The veteran 28th Infantry Di-<br />
vision held the corps center, fronting on<br />
the Our River. The newly arrived and<br />
green 106th Infantry Division had com-<br />
pleted the relief of the 2d Infantry Di-<br />
vision in the Schnee Eifel sector on 12<br />
December. Here the German West Wall<br />
turned northe<strong>as</strong>tward following the<br />
Schnee Eifel crest. In the Losheim Gap,<br />
at the northern terminus of the Schnee<br />
Eifel, a light t<strong>as</strong>k force of the 14th<br />
Cavalry Group maintained a screening<br />
position between the 106th and 99th In-<br />
fantry Divisions. It should be noted that<br />
this w<strong>as</strong> the seam between the VIII and<br />
V Corps.<br />
Although the VIII Corps forward<br />
area possessed many terrain features<br />
favoring the defender, notably the
56 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Schnee Eifel on the left wing and the<br />
river sequence fronting the corps center<br />
and right, t<strong>here</strong> were numerous points<br />
of entry for an attack moving e<strong>as</strong>t to<br />
west. The three infantry divisions under<br />
Middleton’s command were responsible<br />
for a front of about eighty-five miles, a<br />
distance approximately three times that<br />
normally <strong>as</strong>signed an equivalent defend-<br />
ing force by U.S. service school teaching<br />
and tactical doctrine. On the morning<br />
of 16 December the total <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
strength of the VIII Corps w<strong>as</strong> 68,822<br />
officers and men. Immediately after the<br />
Battle of the Bulge, the tag “a calculated<br />
risk” would be applied to the attenuated<br />
VIII Corps front <strong>as</strong> it existed on 16 De-<br />
cember. Middleton w<strong>as</strong> well aware of the<br />
risk-indeed he had made this clear in<br />
discussions with his superiors. Somewhat<br />
after the event General Eisenhower<br />
wrote General of the <strong>Army</strong> George C.<br />
Marshall (on io January 1945) that in<br />
early November he and Bradley had dis-<br />
cussed the possibility of a German coun-<br />
teroffensive in the Ardennes but had<br />
agreed that such a move would be un-<br />
profitable to the enemy. The line of<br />
re<strong>as</strong>oning, <strong>as</strong> set before Marshall, w<strong>as</strong><br />
this: the “Volkssturm” would be no good<br />
in offensive operations, winter in the Ar-<br />
dennes would render continuous logistic<br />
support impossible, and Allied strength<br />
w<strong>as</strong> so great that the Germans could not<br />
push far enough to reach really vital ob-<br />
jectives. 8<br />
Whatever thought may have been<br />
given to the Ardennes, the Allies were<br />
on the offensive and preparing for yet<br />
greater offensive operations well to the<br />
north and the south of the VIII Corps<br />
8 Ltr, Eisenhower to Marshall, 10 Jan 45, in<br />
SHAEF message file, Plans and Operations, folder<br />
27.<br />
sector. Losses during November had<br />
been high and the reserve of new divi-<br />
sions in the United States w<strong>as</strong> running<br />
low (in the United Kingdom such a re-<br />
serve no longer existed). The old mili-<br />
tary axiom that the line cannot be strong<br />
everyw<strong>here</strong> applied with full force to<br />
the Allied positions reaching from<br />
Switzerland to the North Sea. Almost<br />
automatically Allied strength would con-<br />
centrate in those are<strong>as</strong> w<strong>here</strong> the offen-<br />
sive w<strong>as</strong> the order of the day and w<strong>here</strong><br />
decision might be reached. The Ar-<br />
dennes sector seemed no special risk, it<br />
had been quiet for weeks, it offered-or<br />
so it seemed-no terrain attraction for<br />
the enemy, and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no recogniz-<br />
able indication that enemy forces oppo-<br />
site the VIII Corps and 99th Infantry<br />
Division outnumbered those deployed<br />
on the friendly side of the line. If t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> a “calculated risk,” t<strong>here</strong>fore, it w<strong>as</strong><br />
no more precise or specific than that<br />
taken wittingly by any commander who<br />
thins his front to mount an attack while<br />
knowing that he h<strong>as</strong> over-all superiority<br />
and the ability to retain the initiative.<br />
The Intelligence Failure<br />
In the years that have p<strong>as</strong>sed since the<br />
close of World War II the Ardennes h<strong>as</strong><br />
ranked close to Pearl Harbor <strong>as</strong> an epi-<br />
sode inviting public polemic, personal<br />
vituperation, and ex parte vindication.<br />
Sentences, phr<strong>as</strong>es, and punctuation<br />
marks from American intelligence docu-<br />
ments of pre-Ardennes origin have been<br />
twisted and turned, quoted in and out<br />
of context, “interpreted” and misinter-<br />
preted, in arduous efforts to fix blame<br />
and secure absolution. T<strong>here</strong> no longer<br />
is point to such intensely personal exam-<br />
ination of the failure by American and
PREPARATIONS 57<br />
Allied intelligence to give warning of<br />
the Ardennes counteroffensive prepara-<br />
tions. The failure w<strong>as</strong> general and can-<br />
not be attributed to any person or group<br />
of persons. The intelligence story on the<br />
eve of the Ardennes is not germane in<br />
terms of personal opinions or the men<br />
who held them. What counts are the<br />
views held at the various American head-<br />
quarters and the gist of enemy informa-<br />
tion which reached those headquarters. 9<br />
In mid-September the Western Allies<br />
had felt imminent victory in their hands.<br />
Flushed with their own dazzling suc-<br />
cesses and heartened by news of the<br />
bloody defeats which the Soviet armies<br />
were administering to the Germans on<br />
the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front, the Allies saw the<br />
Wehrmacht collapsing and the Third<br />
Reich tottering to its knees. The per-<br />
v<strong>as</strong>ive optimism dissipated <strong>as</strong> the sur-<br />
prisingly revitalized German armies<br />
stood their ground in defense of the West<br />
Wall, but it never completely disap-<br />
peared. When the Allied attack began to<br />
roll again in late November and early<br />
December, some of this earlier optimism<br />
reappeared. A 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group intelli-<br />
gence summary issued on 12 December<br />
echoes the prevailing tone: “It is now<br />
certain that attrition is steadily sapping<br />
the strength of German forces on the<br />
Western Front and that the crust of de-<br />
fenses is thinner, more brittle and more<br />
vulnerable than it appears on our G–2<br />
maps or to the troops in the line.” This<br />
optimism, particularly when heightened<br />
by reports that the enemy no longer had<br />
fuel for tanks and planes, conditioned all<br />
estimates of the enemy’s plans and capa-<br />
9 Pogue, The Supreme Command, pp. 361–72.<br />
This is the best treatment of the problem of<br />
personal responsibilities for the various Allied in-<br />
telligence estimates.<br />
bilities. It may be phr<strong>as</strong>ed this way: the<br />
enemy can still do something but he<br />
can’t do much; he lacks the men, the<br />
planes, the tanks, the fuel, and the am-<br />
munition.<br />
Another <strong>as</strong>pect of Allied thinking<br />
would contribute to the general miscon-<br />
ception of German capabilities and in-<br />
tentions. The return of Field Marshal<br />
von Rundstedt to command in the west<br />
had been marked with much interest by<br />
Allied intelligence staffs. Accepted in<br />
military circles <strong>as</strong> one of the best soldiers<br />
in the world, Rundstedt’s reputation,<br />
even among his opponents, rose to new<br />
stature <strong>as</strong> the result of the stubborn Ger-<br />
man defense in the autumn of 1944.<br />
Here, then, w<strong>as</strong> a commander who<br />
could be expected to act and react ac-<br />
cording to the rational and accepted<br />
canons of the military art. He would<br />
husband his dwindling resources, at an<br />
appropriate time he would counterat-<br />
tack in accordance with available means,<br />
and ultimately he would fall back to the<br />
Rhine for the major defensive battle.<br />
Had Rundstedt actually commanded in<br />
the west, <strong>as</strong> the Allies believed, this<br />
analysis would have been correct.<br />
(Rundstedt’s effort to delimit the scope<br />
of the Ardennes counteroffensive in or-<br />
der to achieve a re<strong>as</strong>onable symbiosis<br />
between the means and the end proves<br />
the point.)<br />
But Hitler alone commanded. Intui-<br />
tion, not conventional professional judg-<br />
ment, would determine German action.<br />
Unaware of the true nature of the<br />
German decision-making process in the<br />
west, the Allied commanders and staffs<br />
awaited an enemy reaction which would<br />
be rational and t<strong>here</strong>fore predictable. If<br />
the thought ever occurred to an Allied<br />
intelligence officer that Germany would
58 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
gamble on one l<strong>as</strong>t great effort west of<br />
the Rhine, staking everything on a single<br />
throw of the dice, this idea disappeared<br />
in the aura of high professional military<br />
competence which attached to Rund-<br />
stedt. In a way this may have been the<br />
field marshal’s greatest personal contri-<br />
bution to the Ardennes counteroffen-<br />
sive.<br />
It is impossible to determine the ex-<br />
tent to which the Hitler cover plan<br />
deceived the Allies into accepting the<br />
area north of the Ardennes <strong>as</strong> the focal<br />
point for the anticipated German reac-<br />
tion. Here the Allies were making their<br />
greatest effort and it w<strong>as</strong> natural to <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sume that the German reserves remain-<br />
ing would be committed to meet this<br />
effort. Even the U.S. Third <strong>Army</strong>, far to<br />
the south, relaxed its normally parochial<br />
view of the front and predicted that the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> would be employed<br />
in a spoiling attack in the Aachen-<br />
Düren sector. Here, too, lay the direct<br />
route to the Ruhr. It long had been an<br />
article of faith in Allied strategy that<br />
Germany would make its greatest efforts<br />
in defense of what Eisenhower had<br />
called the two hearts of Germany: the<br />
Ruhr, the industrial heart, and Berlin,<br />
the political heart. Furthermore, the<br />
area between the Roer and Rhine<br />
Rivers represented good tank-going for<br />
the Allied armored divisions. Duly im-<br />
pressed with their own armored suc-<br />
cesses, the Allies expected that the<br />
enemy would throw his reserve armor<br />
into battle <strong>here</strong> in an attempt to prevent<br />
a repetition of the August tank race<br />
across France. Perhaps German decep-<br />
tion did make some confirmatory contri-<br />
bution, but regardless of this Allied eyes<br />
were fixed immovably on the front<br />
north of the Ardennes.<br />
One item would cause Allied intelli-<br />
gence some concern, although it seems<br />
that this concern w<strong>as</strong> more academic<br />
than real. W<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> Rundstedt’s ar-<br />
mored counterattack reserve, the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong>? Allied situation maps of<br />
early December still carried the head-<br />
quarters of this army in the vicinity of<br />
Cologne, and <strong>as</strong>signed four or five un-<br />
committed panzer divisions <strong>as</strong> available<br />
to this command. But the actual location<br />
of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a matter<br />
of debate. The 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
thought that it might be concentrated<br />
around Bielefeld, northe<strong>as</strong>t of Cologne.<br />
The U.S. First <strong>Army</strong> placed it rather<br />
indefinitely between the Roer and the<br />
Rhine. The U.S. Third <strong>Army</strong> plumped<br />
for a location between Düsseldorf and<br />
Cologne. The U.S. Ninth <strong>Army</strong> appar-<br />
ently did not care to enter this guessing<br />
game. SHAEF intelligence summed up<br />
the matter nicely in the report of io<br />
December: “T<strong>here</strong> is no further news of<br />
Sixth SS Panzer <strong>Army</strong> beyond vague<br />
rumours.”<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> general agreement that<br />
Rundstedt’s armored reserve would be<br />
thrown against the First and Ninth<br />
Armies in an effort to blunt their drive<br />
in the Roer area, although the severe<br />
German reverses sustained in the south<br />
during the second week of December led<br />
to some thought that divisions might be<br />
stripped from the Sixth Panzer reserve<br />
to shore up the defenses of the Palati-<br />
nate. The two U.S. armies carrying the<br />
attack in the north were agreed that the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> would be committed<br />
after their attack had crossed the Roer<br />
River. The 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group expected<br />
the same timing and anticipated the<br />
German reaction would come <strong>as</strong> a co-<br />
ordinated counterattack. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> less
PREPARATIONS 59<br />
Allied interest in the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
than in the Sixth. The former had been<br />
sorely handled in the fight on the Roer<br />
front and the appearance of the Fif-<br />
teenth <strong>Army</strong> in this sector, identified in<br />
the second week of December, led to the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sumption that the Fifth and its most<br />
badly battered divisions had been with-<br />
drawn for rest and necessary overhaul.<br />
On 12 December the 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
reported the Fifth <strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembling its<br />
weary divisions between Cologne and<br />
Koblenz.<br />
American intelligence summaries,<br />
periodic reports, and briefing precis, for<br />
the month prior to the 16 December <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault, gave only fragmentary and skeletal<br />
information on the enemy opposite the<br />
VIII Corps. German planners had pre-<br />
dicted that the American high com-<br />
manders would accept the theory that the<br />
rugged terrain in this area, particularly<br />
in poor weather, effectively precluded<br />
large-scale mechanized operations. Per-<br />
haps t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> some subconscious <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sumption by American staffs that the<br />
Ardennes w<strong>as</strong> so nearly imp<strong>as</strong>sable <strong>as</strong> to<br />
be ruled out of consideration. But t<strong>here</strong><br />
were more tangible re<strong>as</strong>ons for the<br />
scant attention accorded this sector. It<br />
had been a quiet sector of the Western<br />
Front since the Allied d<strong>as</strong>h across France<br />
had halted in September. The German<br />
divisions identified <strong>here</strong> <strong>as</strong> fairly perma-<br />
nent residents were battle weary, under-<br />
strength, and obviously in need of rest<br />
and refitting. At various times fresh<br />
divisions had appeared opposite the<br />
VIII Corps, but their stay had been<br />
brief. By December it had become axio-<br />
matic, insofar <strong>as</strong> U.S. intelligence w<strong>as</strong><br />
concerned, that any new division identi-<br />
fied on the VIII Corps front w<strong>as</strong> no more<br />
than a bird of p<strong>as</strong>sage en route to the<br />
north or the south. As a result the<br />
Ardennes <strong>as</strong>sumed a kind of neutral hue<br />
in American eyes. Important happen-<br />
ings, it seemed, transpired north of the<br />
Ardennes and south of the Ardennes, but<br />
never at the division point itself. This<br />
mental set offers a partial explanation<br />
of why the 99th Division in the V Corps<br />
zone identified only three of the twelve<br />
German divisions <strong>as</strong>sembling to its<br />
front, while the VIII Corps identified<br />
only four out of ten divisions before 16<br />
December.<br />
W<strong>as</strong> t<strong>here</strong> any warning note sounded<br />
for the VIII Corps and its troops in the<br />
line during the days just prior to the<br />
German onslaught? With the advantage<br />
of hindsight, seven items can be dis-<br />
cerned in the corps reports for the period<br />
13–15 December which might have given<br />
the alarm. Two divisions, the 28th and<br />
106th, sent in reports of incre<strong>as</strong>ed vehic-<br />
ular activity on the nights before the<br />
attack. The 28th discounted its own re-<br />
port by noting that this w<strong>as</strong> the normal<br />
accompaniment of an enemy front-line<br />
relief and that the same thing had hap-<br />
pened when a German unit had pulled<br />
out three weeks before. The 106th w<strong>as</strong><br />
a green division and unlikely to know<br />
what weight could be attached legiti-<br />
mately to such activity. In fact one<br />
regimental commander rebuked his S–2<br />
for reporting this noise <strong>as</strong> “enemy move-<br />
ment.” A third incident occurred on 14<br />
December when a woman escapee re-<br />
ported to the 28th Infantry Division<br />
commander that the woods near Bitburg<br />
were jammed with German equipment.<br />
Her answers to questions posed by the<br />
division G–2 apparently were impres-<br />
sive enough to gain the attention of the<br />
VIII Corps G–2 who ordered that she<br />
be taken to the First <strong>Army</strong> headquarters.
60<br />
The woman arrived t<strong>here</strong> on 16 Decem-<br />
ber.<br />
The four remaining incidents attach<br />
to the capture of German prisoners on<br />
15 December, two each by the 4th and<br />
106th Infantry Divisions. The time of<br />
capture is important: two at 1830, one<br />
at 1930, and one at an unspecified time<br />
t<strong>here</strong>after. All four claimed that fresh<br />
troops were arriving in the line, that a<br />
big attack w<strong>as</strong> in the offing, that it might<br />
come on the 16th or 17th but certainly<br />
would be made before Christm<strong>as</strong>. Two<br />
of the prisoners were deserters; they<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
themselves did not take the reported<br />
attack too seriously since, <strong>as</strong> they told<br />
their captors, all this had been promised<br />
German troops before. The other two<br />
were wounded. One seems to have made<br />
some impression on the interrogators,<br />
but since he w<strong>as</strong> under the influence of<br />
morphine his captors decided that fur-<br />
ther questioning would be necessary.<br />
<strong>Of</strong> the seven incidents which in retro-<br />
spect may be considered signposts point-<br />
ing to an impending attack on the VIII<br />
Corps front, only four were reported to<br />
the corps headquarters. Three of the<br />
PANZERKAMPFWAGENS V (PANTHER) EN ROUTE TO THE FRONT
PREPARATIONS 61<br />
four prisoners seemed to be parroting<br />
wild and b<strong>as</strong>eless rumors of a sort which<br />
w<strong>as</strong> fairly common, and these three were<br />
bundled into prisoner of war cages without<br />
further ado. The incidents reported<br />
to the VIII Corps were forwarded to<br />
the First <strong>Army</strong> and duly noted by that<br />
headquarters on 14 and 15 December.<br />
Only one incident w<strong>as</strong> deemed worthy<br />
of 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group attention. This,<br />
one of the reports of extraordinary traffic,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> mentioned in the commanding<br />
general’s briefing <strong>as</strong> confirmation of the<br />
predicted relief of the 326th Infantry<br />
Division. This briefing began at 0915 on<br />
16 December. 10<br />
Perhaps the appearance of these seven<br />
indicators might have been treated in<br />
combination to uncover the German<br />
preparations and allow the VIII Corps<br />
at le<strong>as</strong>t a minimum tactical preparation<br />
for the attack. Whether any commander<br />
would have been justified in making<br />
major alterations in his troop disposition<br />
on the b<strong>as</strong>is of this intelligence alone<br />
is highly questionable. One might more<br />
re<strong>as</strong>onably conclude that the American<br />
acquisition of only this limited and suspect<br />
information w<strong>as</strong> a tribute to the<br />
security me<strong>as</strong>ures enacted by the enemy.<br />
What of air intelligence, the source of<br />
Rundstedt’s greatest worry? Bad weather<br />
during the first half of December did<br />
reduce the number of Allied reconnaissance<br />
sorties flown e<strong>as</strong>t of the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
front but by no means produced the kind<br />
of blackout for which the enemy hoped.<br />
In the month prior to the Ardennes<br />
attack the 67th Tactical Reconnaissance<br />
10 The intelligence sources bearing on the Allied<br />
failure to appreciate the coming German counter-<br />
offensive have been gat<strong>here</strong>d by Royce L. Thomp-<br />
son in a study entitled American Intelligence on<br />
the German Counteroffensive, 2 vols. (1949). MS<br />
in OCMH files.<br />
Group (IX Tactical Air Command),<br />
supporting the First <strong>Army</strong>, flew 361<br />
missions of which 242 were judged suc-<br />
cessful. From the 10th through the 15th<br />
of December the group flew 71 missions<br />
with varying degrees of success; for ex-<br />
ample, on 14 December planes flown<br />
over Trier by the 30th Photo Reconnais-<br />
sance Squadron reported the weather<br />
clear, but two hours later a second mis-<br />
sion ran into haze and w<strong>as</strong> able to see<br />
very little. Only one day, 13 December,<br />
in the five critical days before the attack<br />
found all U.S. air reconnaissance<br />
grounded. 11<br />
The pilots belonging to the 67th<br />
Group and the 10th Photo Reconnais-<br />
sance Group, the latter attached to the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong>’s old partner, the XIX<br />
TAG, actually constructed an imposing<br />
picture of German build-up west of the<br />
Rhine in the month preceding the Ar-<br />
dennes counteroffensive. In the l<strong>as</strong>t week<br />
of November the number of enemy<br />
columns on the roads showed a marked<br />
incre<strong>as</strong>e. On 30 November U.S. recon-<br />
naissance planes reported a dr<strong>as</strong>tic<br />
heightening of rail activity west of the<br />
Rhine and this w<strong>as</strong> confirmed by the<br />
fighter-bombers flying “armed-recce.”<br />
Special indications of forthcoming attack<br />
were numerous: a large number of hos-<br />
pital trains on the west bank of the<br />
Rhine, several groups of flatcars car-<br />
rying Tiger tanks, and fifty searchlights<br />
in one location. Lights representing<br />
large-scale night movements were con-<br />
sistently reported, although the two<br />
available night fighter squadrons were<br />
11 Royce L. Thompson h<strong>as</strong> compiled a complete<br />
collection of excerpts from pertinent Air Force<br />
records bearing on the operations of the U.S.<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Air Forces during the Ardennes battle:<br />
Tactical Air Ph<strong>as</strong>e of the Ardennes Campaign, 2<br />
vols. (1950). MS in OCMH files.
62 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
so badly understrength (averaging no<br />
more than ten P–61’s operational) that<br />
their contribution perforce w<strong>as</strong> limited. 12<br />
The intelligence problem presented<br />
by the U.S. air effort w<strong>as</strong> not that of a<br />
paucity of information but rather one<br />
of interpretation. Both the Allied ground<br />
and air headquarters expected the enemy<br />
to reinforce those sectors to the north<br />
and south of the Ardennes w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
First and Third U.S. Armies were attack-<br />
ing. The main special indicators of<br />
coming attack were identified in transit<br />
are<strong>as</strong> on the routes to the Roer and the<br />
Saar. The trainloads of Tiger tanks, for<br />
example, were seen on the Euskirchen<br />
rail lines. This line ran northwest to<br />
Düren and the Roer, but a branch line<br />
led south to the Eifel. The reports of<br />
searchlights, turned in on the night of<br />
6–7 December, came from the vicinity<br />
of Kaiserslautern, opposite the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong>. Kaiserslautern, however, w<strong>as</strong> only<br />
a few miles by rail from Trier, one of<br />
the chief unloading yards opposite the<br />
VIII Corps. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> considerable<br />
information, then, of the enemy’s grow-<br />
ing strength west of the Rhine. But the<br />
interpretation of his intentions w<strong>as</strong> pre-<br />
cisely what he desired: reinforcement of<br />
the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> counterattack<br />
reserve on the Roer front and piecemeal<br />
movement to shore up the divisions<br />
being battered by the Third and Seventh<br />
Armies.<br />
W<strong>as</strong> t<strong>here</strong> any special attempt at air<br />
reconnaissance over the Eifel? A large<br />
number of missions were flown <strong>here</strong> in<br />
November, that is, before the final <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembly for attack began. During the first<br />
half of December the 67th Group rather<br />
consistently included Eifel targets in its<br />
12 Craven and Cate, eds., Europe: ARGUMENT<br />
to V–E Day, p. 675.<br />
daily mission orders; however, these<br />
missions were given low priority and<br />
often were scratched. In the critical<br />
period (10 through 15 December) the<br />
67th flew only three missions directly<br />
opposite the VIII Corps, on 14 Decem-<br />
ber over Trier. Numerous requests for<br />
air reconnaissance were made during<br />
this time by the VIII Corps divisions,<br />
but even when accepted by higher<br />
ground echelons and forwarded to air<br />
headquarters these missions retained so<br />
low a priority, when contr<strong>as</strong>ted with the<br />
demands from the Roer and Saar fronts,<br />
<strong>as</strong> to fall at the bottom of the missions<br />
list. In sum, it can be said that the<br />
reconnaissance flown over the Eifel be-<br />
between 16 November and 15 December<br />
gave much information on enemy activ-<br />
ity, but that this w<strong>as</strong> interpreted <strong>as</strong><br />
routine troop movement through the<br />
Eifel way-station en route to the north<br />
and the south. Thus, the SHAEF intel-<br />
ligence summary of 10 December gives<br />
air reports of “continuing troop move-<br />
ments towards the Eifel sector” and con-<br />
cludes that “the procession is not yet<br />
ended.”<br />
Could the proper combination of air<br />
and ground intelligence have weakened<br />
the Allied fixation on the Roer and Saar<br />
sectors? Perhaps, but this is extremely<br />
hypothetical. One thing seems clear.<br />
Although the ground headquarters were<br />
charged with the final analysis of photos<br />
and pilot reports secured by the air,<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little co-operation and liaison<br />
between the air and ground headquar-<br />
ters <strong>as</strong> to the initial interpretation placed<br />
by the air forces on the data gat<strong>here</strong>d<br />
through aerial reconnaissance. The offi-<br />
cial U.S. <strong>Army</strong> Air Forces account of<br />
this episode states the c<strong>as</strong>e justly: “Per-<br />
haps the chief fault w<strong>as</strong> one of organiza-
PREPARATIONS 63<br />
tion, for t<strong>here</strong> seems to have been a<br />
twilight zone between air and ground<br />
headquarters in which the responsibility<br />
had not been sufficiently pinned<br />
down.” 13<br />
On 15 December the Allied air com-<br />
manders’ conference at SHAEF convened<br />
to review the big picture. Here the<br />
SHAEF G–3 told the <strong>as</strong>sembled airmen<br />
that the Roer dam operations had failed<br />
to provoke a move by the main enemy<br />
armored reserve; <strong>as</strong> for the VIII Corps<br />
front, “nothing to report.” Then the<br />
A–2 rose to sketch the activities of the<br />
Luftwaffe: it had continued the move-<br />
ment westward, closer to the battlefield,<br />
which had been noted in recent days,<br />
but all this w<strong>as</strong> “defensive” only.<br />
The prelude to the Ardennes counter-<br />
offensive of 16 December can only be<br />
reckoned <strong>as</strong> a gross failure by Allied<br />
ground and air intelligence. One of the<br />
greatest skills in the practice of the mil-<br />
itary art is the avoidance of the natural<br />
tendency to overrate or underestimate<br />
the enemy. Here, the enemy capability<br />
for reacting other than to direct Allied<br />
pressure had been sadly underestimated.<br />
Americans and British had looked in a<br />
mirror for the enemy and seen t<strong>here</strong><br />
only the reflection of their own in-<br />
tentions.<br />
The German Concentration<br />
Hitler’s operation directive of 10<br />
November set 27 November <strong>as</strong> the date<br />
for completion of the huge concentra-<br />
tion preliminary to the Ardennes coun-<br />
teroffensive, with a target date two days<br />
earlier for the’ attack by the divisions in<br />
the initial thrust. But his commanders<br />
13 Ibid., p. 681.<br />
in the west, better versed in logistics,<br />
recognized from the first that the attack<br />
could not be made before the very l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the month. The Allied attacks in the<br />
Aachen and Metz sectors made further<br />
postponement unavoidable, pinning<br />
German divisions to the front long be-<br />
yond their planned date of relief and<br />
bringing others back into the line when<br />
refitting had only just begun. Inside the<br />
Greater Reich the Replacement <strong>Army</strong>,<br />
charged with creating and training new<br />
Volks Grenadier divisions for the offen-<br />
sive, proved Hitler’s optimism ill-<br />
founded. The t<strong>as</strong>k of building new divi-<br />
sions from air force troops, sailors, and<br />
the products of Goebbel’s raid on the<br />
remaining civilian population w<strong>as</strong> im-<br />
mense, the timing necessarily slow. In<br />
early December, when Hitler’s target<br />
date had come and gone, another factor<br />
intervened to cause delay. The prelim-<br />
inary movement of armored divisions<br />
and vehicular columns had burned up<br />
far more fuel than German quarterm<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ters had reckoned. The attack would<br />
have to be delayed until the diminished<br />
fuel tanks west of the Rhine could be<br />
replenished.<br />
The concentration period, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
would run until 16 December but even<br />
these added days gave all too short a<br />
time for such a formidable array of prep-<br />
arations. The original plans called for<br />
the movement and <strong>as</strong>sembly of 4 armies,<br />
11 corps, 38 divisions, 9 Volks artillery<br />
corps, and 7 Yolks Werfer brigades,<br />
plus service and support troops. By the<br />
beginning of December OKW’s inflated<br />
order of battle had been reduced to<br />
about 30 divisions (the Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong><br />
now w<strong>as</strong> deleted from the initial attack<br />
order, although still envisioned <strong>as</strong> the<br />
subsidiary attack force) , but the logistics
64 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
problem remained of staggering proportions.<br />
The area in which the <strong>Army</strong> Group B<br />
would concentrate its forces, equipment,<br />
and supplies w<strong>as</strong> delimited on the south<br />
by the Moselle River and had <strong>as</strong> its b<strong>as</strong>e<br />
the Rhine crossings stretching from<br />
Dusseldorf to Koblenz. On the north<br />
t<strong>here</strong> were actually two limits. That<br />
farthest north ran from the Rhine west<br />
on the axis Munchen-Gladbach and<br />
Roermond. South of this line Allied<br />
intelligence officers watched, <strong>as</strong> they<br />
were intended to watch, the daylight,<br />
only half-disguised, movement of German<br />
troops and supplies. Farther south<br />
a second and true limit defined the main<br />
concentration area. Here the line extended<br />
from Bonn, through Euskirchen,<br />
to the front north of Monschau. The<br />
trick, then, would be to effect a large<br />
and secret concentration south of this<br />
second line while at the same time preparing<br />
to sideslip the forces from the<br />
north into this sector in the l<strong>as</strong>t hours<br />
before the attack.<br />
The first problem of organization w<strong>as</strong><br />
that of rail transport. 14 Troops, tanks,<br />
and guns had to be brought from E<strong>as</strong>t<br />
Prussia, Poland, Austria, the Netherlands,<br />
Denmark, and Norway. Fuel and<br />
ammunition had to be hauled across the<br />
exposed Rhine bridges and unloaded<br />
quickly and quietly at the Eifel dumps.<br />
A number of divisions, in particular<br />
those <strong>as</strong>signed to the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>,<br />
would have to be shuttled from the<br />
battle front back across the Rhine to<br />
14 The best study on German rail movements<br />
and explanation of pertinent German sources will<br />
be found in Charles V. P. von Luttichau’s manu-<br />
script, German Rail Communications in the<br />
Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive, 1944–45 (1952). OCMH. See<br />
also the OB WEST KTB and Anlage for the sup-<br />
ply build-up prior to the attack.<br />
training and refitting are<strong>as</strong>, then be<br />
moved across the Rhine again and into<br />
the concentration zone.<br />
Probably no railway system in the<br />
world w<strong>as</strong> better able to handle this<br />
tremendous t<strong>as</strong>k than the Reichsbahn<br />
(the German State Railroads). It had<br />
been modernized on the eve of the war,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> a model of efficient management,<br />
and, through a program of systematic<br />
looting, had more than replaced the<br />
rolling stock lost to air attack. The cars<br />
and the locomotives in large freight<br />
yards, <strong>as</strong> many American soldiers will<br />
remember, read like a European rail-<br />
road gazetteer. Militarization of the<br />
German railroads w<strong>as</strong> complete. The<br />
German <strong>Army</strong> had been the first in his-<br />
tory to employ railroads for a great<br />
strategic concentration, and the suc-<br />
cesses of 1870 had led to a tradition in<br />
General Staff thought and training<br />
which looked to the rail system <strong>as</strong> the<br />
primary means of strategic concentra-<br />
tion. The rail lines along the Rhine and<br />
west of the river had been located in<br />
accordance with military desires, The<br />
Eifel branches had been constructed in<br />
preparation for the First World War,<br />
then had been reinforced for the cam-<br />
paign of 1940. But t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> more than<br />
the tradition of the great General Staff<br />
to dictate this reliance on rail: Hitler’s<br />
scheme for a military superhighway<br />
system, the Reichsauto bahnen, had been<br />
cut short by the war; the Allied attacks<br />
against motor fuel production had de-<br />
pleted German stocks, although hardly<br />
to the extent that Allied intelligence<br />
estimated in the autumn of 1944.<br />
The major threat, of course, w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
overwhelming superiority of the Allied<br />
air forces and their ability, no longer<br />
effectively challenged by the Luftwaffe,
PREPARATIONS 65<br />
to look and to strike almost at will. Ger-<br />
man railway preparations, <strong>as</strong> a result,<br />
had to take count of three dangers:<br />
Allied air reconnaissance over the Eifel<br />
and its rail approaches, bombing attacks<br />
to knock out the Rhine rail bridges, and<br />
rail-cutting attacks stepped up to the<br />
point w<strong>here</strong> repair efforts could no<br />
longer hold the pace. In the short run,<br />
decisions on the form of the air war<br />
reached in the higher Allied councils<br />
during the autumn of 1944 made the<br />
German t<strong>as</strong>k much e<strong>as</strong>ier; in the long<br />
run, these same decisions contributed to<br />
the final failure of the Ardennes counter-<br />
offensive.<br />
British and American air leaders had<br />
found themselves consistently at logger-<br />
heads on the issue of transportation<br />
versus oil targets. The American view<br />
w<strong>as</strong> that the German rail system con-<br />
stituted too complex a target to be<br />
demolished in any re<strong>as</strong>onable time,<br />
but that enemy oil production w<strong>as</strong> so<br />
highly concentrated (particularly in the<br />
synthetic oil plants) <strong>as</strong> to permit a kill-<br />
ing blow in the time and with the effort<br />
available. Before 16 December the<br />
American view held first priority. In-<br />
deed, during the month of October<br />
second place w<strong>as</strong> accorded to attacks-<br />
subsequently judged <strong>as</strong> “rather incon-<br />
clusive”-against ordnance depots, tank<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembly plants, and motor vehicle pro-<br />
duction. Eventually, at the close of Oc-<br />
tober, the British succeeded in raising<br />
the priority on rail attacks, although this<br />
remained second to those on oil. Novem-<br />
ber w<strong>as</strong> the big month for attacks against<br />
the latter, the Allied strategic air forces<br />
dropping 37,096 tons aimed at German<br />
oil production. In the second half of<br />
the month, however, the rail campaign<br />
stepped up; the Eighth Air Force and<br />
the RAF actually delivered more bombs<br />
against rail than against oil targets. The<br />
Rhine bridges presented a special prob-<br />
lem. In November the SHAEF G–2<br />
<strong>as</strong>ked that the air mount a campaign to<br />
cut these bridges, but on this the Amer-<br />
ican and British air commanders were<br />
in accord. The great Rhine bridges,<br />
heavily guarded by flak, were tough<br />
targets for the bombing techniques then<br />
current and the Allied air forces suc-<br />
ceeded in staving off this demand.<br />
German records, fairly full for the<br />
final quarter of 1944, give this picture<br />
of the effects of Allied air attacks. The<br />
Reichsbahn moved troop strength by<br />
rail equivalent to sixty-six divisions be-<br />
fore the attack. 15 Forces equivalent to<br />
seven divisions were moved by road.<br />
Twenty-seven of the division-size rail<br />
movements were affected in some way<br />
by air attack, in most c<strong>as</strong>es before they<br />
actually entered the build-up zone. De-<br />
lays normally were no longer than one<br />
or two days, although from 10 December<br />
on some divisions were forced to march<br />
an extra fifty to sixty miles on foot. A<br />
number of units lost essential organic<br />
equipment during these attacks, the<br />
deprivation inevitably inhibiting their<br />
later performance. Very noticeable ef-<br />
fects of Allied air efforts came on 10 and<br />
11 December. On the first day a noon<br />
attack over the Koblenz rail yards left<br />
more than a hundred bomb craters.<br />
Nonetheless, the yards were in full<br />
operation twenty-four hours later. The<br />
main double-track line supporting the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembly (Cologne-<br />
Euskirchen) w<strong>as</strong> hit so severely <strong>as</strong> to<br />
stop all rail traffic on 11 December: but<br />
15 Detailed<br />
troop movements have been worked<br />
out in Luttichau, Rail Communications, ch. VII,<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sim.
66 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the line w<strong>as</strong> running again on the 12th.<br />
Two Rhine rail bridges took hits in<br />
November and four were under repair<br />
<strong>as</strong> the result of attacks during October.<br />
In all c<strong>as</strong>es at le<strong>as</strong>t one rail line per<br />
bridge remained operable. An Allied<br />
plane hit one bridge with one bomb<br />
during the first half of December. Supply<br />
shipments generally went unscathed in<br />
the actual concentration area. About<br />
five hundred trains were employed to<br />
effect this build-up, of which air attack<br />
in October and November destroyed<br />
only fifteen carloads.<br />
In sum, the greatest menace to the<br />
German rail concentration came from<br />
attacks by bombers and fighter-bombers<br />
against railroad tracks, stations, and<br />
yards. Hardly a day p<strong>as</strong>sed without one<br />
or more breaks somew<strong>here</strong> in the system<br />
at and west of the Rhine. During the<br />
first two weeks of December the Allied<br />
air attacks inflicted 125 breaks on the<br />
rails feeding the Western Front, 60 of<br />
which were in the concentration area.<br />
German engineers, still working on<br />
November cuts, repaired 150 breaks of<br />
which 100 were in the concentration<br />
area. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong>, then, an une<strong>as</strong>y equi-<br />
librium between Allied air attacks and<br />
the German rail repair capability. Be<br />
it remembered, however, that the Allied<br />
air campaign against the Reichsbahn<br />
thus far w<strong>as</strong> dispersed and a matter of<br />
second priority.<br />
If nuclear weapons do not succeed in<br />
entirely removing rail transport from<br />
the logistic systems of future war, the<br />
German handling of the Ardennes build-<br />
up will stand <strong>as</strong> a military model. As<br />
a part of military history, the story of<br />
this German success, achieved despite<br />
Allied dominance in the air, merits some<br />
attention. One of Hitler’s first concerns,<br />
following the fateful decision to gamble<br />
everything on a single stroke in the west,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to <strong>as</strong>sure himself that the Rhine<br />
bridges would be secure and that the<br />
Reichsbahn could bear the weight he<br />
intended to impose upon it. Sometime<br />
during September-an exact date is<br />
lacking-the OKH Chief of Trans-<br />
portation, General der Infanterie<br />
Rudolf Gercke, w<strong>as</strong> admitted to the<br />
tiny circle of those entrusted with<br />
the Ardennes plans. His initial t<strong>as</strong>k w<strong>as</strong><br />
to deal with the Rhine River crossing<br />
sites; this w<strong>as</strong> the priority through Sep-<br />
tember and October. First the pillars<br />
and piers supporting the Rhine bridges<br />
were reinforced so that a lucky hit could<br />
not send an entire bridge into the Rhine<br />
waters. Next, a number of ferries were<br />
modified to carry trains and a few high-<br />
way bridges were strengthened for<br />
tracklaying in the event that the regular<br />
railroad bridges failed. Special heavy<br />
spans of military bridging were floated<br />
into waiting positions along the banks.<br />
(At one time plans were made to ex-<br />
pand two mining tunnels which ran<br />
under the Rhine so that troops could be<br />
marched from one side to the other.)<br />
Ruhr industry contributed large stocks<br />
of steel girders and plates; these stocks<br />
were then distributed for quick repair<br />
jobs at the main rail bridges. Early in<br />
October reinforcement w<strong>as</strong> introduced<br />
on a number of bridges to permit the<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sage of trains carrying the 70-ton<br />
King Tiger tanks. By early December<br />
eight railway bridges were ready imme-<br />
diately behind the <strong>as</strong>sembly area, plus<br />
an equal number of highway bridges<br />
and twelve Rhine ferries capable of<br />
handling locomotives. An additional<br />
four rail bridges, lower down on the<br />
Rhine, were scheduled for use if needed.
PREPARATIONS 67<br />
The Allied decision to forgo any inten-<br />
sive attacks against the Rhine crossings<br />
gave this segment of the German rail<br />
system relative immunity during the<br />
build-up. The actual trackage and the<br />
freight yards, particularly those west of<br />
the Rhine, had no such immunity and<br />
would come under incre<strong>as</strong>ing attack in<br />
late November just when the concentra-<br />
tion w<strong>as</strong> swinging into full stride. Almost<br />
completely bereft of any friendly air<br />
cover, how did the Germans keep their<br />
rail transport functioning? Recall that<br />
the Wehrmacht had been forced to per-<br />
fect the art of camouflage, that the tra-<br />
ditionally severe German discipline<br />
functioned now<strong>here</strong> better than in the<br />
rigorous control of troop movement, and<br />
that the Reichsbahn w<strong>as</strong> an integral<br />
member of the body military.<br />
The first me<strong>as</strong>ure adopted to protect<br />
military trains from Allied observation<br />
and attack aimed at the utmost use of<br />
darkness and bad flying weather. All<br />
rail movement west of the line Bremen-<br />
K<strong>as</strong>sel-Ulm, a distance of 150–200 miles<br />
from the fighting front, w<strong>as</strong> confined to<br />
those times when air reconnaissance<br />
would be stymied. A few exceptions,<br />
for purposes of deception, were per-<br />
mitted in the Aachen area. Control w<strong>as</strong><br />
decentralized and even the smaller rail<br />
stations were tied in to the main Ger-<br />
man weather service so <strong>as</strong> to wring the<br />
most mileage out of any local change in<br />
the weather. Supply trains were organ-<br />
ized e<strong>as</strong>t of the Rhine and t<strong>here</strong> allo-<br />
cated a particular line and army. Every<br />
effort w<strong>as</strong> made to load down the branch<br />
lines, particularly when it became ap-<br />
parent that the Allies tended to con-<br />
centrate on the main lines.<br />
Train movement w<strong>as</strong> very carefully<br />
controlled. The thick forests of the Eifel,<br />
plus an unusual number of rail tunnels<br />
near the chief supply dumps, gave con-<br />
siderable chance of concealment. Wher-<br />
ever possible the run w<strong>as</strong> made to the<br />
unloading point and back to the west<br />
bank of the Rhine in one night. On<br />
double-tracked lines the movement w<strong>as</strong><br />
restricted to one-way traffic, then re-<br />
versed. A host of small stations were<br />
given extra siding so that trains could be<br />
stationed serially all along the line and<br />
unloaded simultaneously. This system<br />
also permitted quick distribution to the<br />
many small, concealed dumps. Earlier<br />
it had been discovered that engine crews<br />
often were killed by Allied strafing<br />
while the locomotive remained intact.<br />
Special light armor plate t<strong>here</strong>fore w<strong>as</strong><br />
introduced on all cabs. Also, it had been<br />
noticed that fighter-bomber pilots<br />
tended to work on a train at relatively<br />
high altitudes when subjected to anti-<br />
aircraft fire. All trains, then, would<br />
carry a section of light flak. So success-<br />
ful were these me<strong>as</strong>ures that a number<br />
of divisions actually detrained at rail-<br />
heads only eight to twenty miles behind<br />
the front.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> were four main double-track<br />
lines running into the Eifel. From 4<br />
September to io December all were<br />
under the control of the Seventh <strong>Army</strong>,<br />
but on 10 December the two panzer<br />
armies moved in to take command of<br />
their own sectors. In the north, two<br />
lines, Cologne-Duren and Bonn-Euskir-<br />
chen, handled the bulk of Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> traffic. The Ahr River line, fed<br />
mainly by the Remagen bridge, sup-<br />
ported the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. The<br />
Moselle line, following the old Napole-<br />
onic “cannon road,” handled the Sev-<br />
enth <strong>Army</strong> trains plus some traffic for<br />
the Fifth. Although less rich in rail than
68 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
are<strong>as</strong> to the north and south, the Eifel<br />
possessed a substantial, crisscross net of<br />
feeder lines. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> one main lateral<br />
line quite close to the front, that via<br />
Euskirchen-Kall-Ehrang-Trier. Until 16<br />
December the main troop detraining<br />
points were Schleiden, Stadtkyll, Prum,<br />
Niederweiss, the west station at Trier,<br />
and Konz. In addition t<strong>here</strong> were four<br />
chief are<strong>as</strong> for unloading supplies:<br />
Rheinbach, Mechernich, Muesch (near<br />
Ahrdorf) , and Kall.<br />
The amount of ammunition and POL<br />
required to support the attack imposed<br />
a severe load not only upon the dwin-<br />
dling German war economy but on the<br />
Eifel rail system <strong>as</strong> well. Hitler had<br />
allocated one hundred trains of ammuni-<br />
tion to nourish the counteroffensive, this<br />
coming from the special Fuehrer Re-<br />
serve. Over and above this special re-<br />
serve, Generalmajor Alfred <strong>To</strong>ppe, the<br />
O berquartermeister, figured on scraping<br />
together four units of what in German<br />
practice w<strong>as</strong> considered a b<strong>as</strong>ic load. <strong>Of</strong><br />
these units, one w<strong>as</strong> allocated for the<br />
artillery barrage preparatory to the<br />
attack, one half would be used in break-<br />
ing through the enemy main line of<br />
resistance, and one and a half would be<br />
fired to keep the offensive rolling. <strong>To</strong>ppe<br />
had planned to have two b<strong>as</strong>ic loads of<br />
ammunition in the hands of troops when<br />
the attack commenced and did deliver<br />
the loads <strong>as</strong> scheduled. However, he had<br />
not counted on the Allied attacks, fur-<br />
nishing only enough extra ammunition<br />
for the normal day-to-day battle in the<br />
west. By the second week of December<br />
the two b<strong>as</strong>ic loads had been whittled<br />
down to one and a half. Even so, on the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t day reported–13 December–<strong>Army</strong><br />
Group B had 15,099 tons of ammunition<br />
in its dumps. The heavy concentration<br />
of antiaircraft artillery scheduled to sup-<br />
port the attack w<strong>as</strong> better off than the<br />
ground gunners: the III Flak Corps, with<br />
66 heavy and 74 medium and light<br />
batteries, had 7 b<strong>as</strong>ic loads of ammuni-<br />
tion. In net, the <strong>Army</strong> Group B logisti-<br />
cians estimated the attack would average<br />
a daily ammunition consumption of<br />
about 1,200 tons. Needless to say this<br />
figure w<strong>as</strong> b<strong>as</strong>ed on a f<strong>as</strong>t-moving ex-<br />
ploitation once the breakthrough w<strong>as</strong><br />
accomplished.<br />
Motor fuel, a notorious logistic prob-<br />
lem in German armies at this stage of<br />
the war, w<strong>as</strong> the greatest headache in<br />
the Western Front headquarters, partic-<br />
ularly in the l<strong>as</strong>t days before the attack.<br />
The journals of OB WEST are jammed<br />
during this period with messages<br />
attempting to trace promised trainloads<br />
of POL. By 16 December, however, the<br />
quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter and rail systems had com-<br />
bined to put the promised 4,680,000<br />
gallons in the hands of OB WEST,<br />
although perhaps half of this w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
dumps back at .the Rhine.<br />
During the period 9 September–15<br />
December the Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, or main,<br />
concentration area received 1,502 troop<br />
trains and approximately 500 supply<br />
trains, most of which were earmarked<br />
for the counteroffensive. The Eifel rail<br />
net in this time unloaded 144,735 tons<br />
of supplies. At some point the Eifel rail<br />
system would be saturated; this point<br />
w<strong>as</strong> reached on 17 December when OB<br />
WEST w<strong>as</strong> forced to detrain its incom-<br />
ing reserve divisions on the west bank<br />
of the Rhine, a factor of some signifi-<br />
cance in the ensuing history of the Ar-<br />
dennes battle.<br />
With the Allies hammering at the<br />
Roer, pushing along the Saar, and con-<br />
verging on the Saverne Gap, the Arden-
PREPARATIONS 69<br />
nes target date–25 November-p<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
into discard. On that day Hitler re-<br />
viewed the situation with his household<br />
military staff. The enemy offensive, said<br />
he, had fulfilled the major prerequisites<br />
for a successful German attack. The<br />
Allies had taken heavy losses and had<br />
been forced to deploy their reserves<br />
close behind the attack front or feed<br />
them into the line. Now, more than ever,<br />
the Fuehrer w<strong>as</strong> convinced of the Big<br />
Solution’s fe<strong>as</strong>ibility. From somew<strong>here</strong><br />
in lower echelons the idea had been<br />
broached that the Meuse crossing sites<br />
should be seized on the first day. This<br />
brought hearty concurrence. Advance<br />
battalions should try for the Meuse<br />
bridges in the early morning (Hitler<br />
probably referred <strong>here</strong> to the end of the<br />
first 24-hour period). Again Hitler<br />
stressed the need for penetrations on<br />
narrow fronts, but once the break-<br />
through w<strong>as</strong> accomplished he foresaw<br />
considerable maneuver <strong>as</strong> the two panzer<br />
armies hit the Meuse. <strong>To</strong> ensure flexi-<br />
bility in the choice of bridgeheads, he<br />
extended the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> zone<br />
(on the right) to include the crossings<br />
at Huy, while the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
southern boundary moved down to<br />
Givet. It may be that in this same brief-<br />
ing the Fuehrer set a new D-day. In any<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e Jodl visited Rundstedt on 26 No-<br />
vember and delivered the news that<br />
Null Tag (D-day) would be 10 Decem-<br />
ber. This date finally w<strong>as</strong> scrapped be-<br />
cause the fuel dumps were not full and<br />
a number of the <strong>as</strong>sault divisions were<br />
s oute to the c oncentration zone.<br />
on the 11th Hitler approved further<br />
postponement until 0530 on 15 Decem-<br />
ber, then on 12 December altered the<br />
attack Order to read the 16th, with the<br />
usual proviso that if good flying weather<br />
intervened the whole operation would<br />
stop dead in its tracks. 16<br />
The rail movement of the initial<br />
attack divisions had nearly ended by 11<br />
December, although the transport of the<br />
second ph<strong>as</strong>e formations, belonging to<br />
the OKW reserve, still had a few days<br />
to go. 17 The Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, quondam<br />
caretaker on the Ardennes front, had<br />
most of its divisions in the line but in<br />
the nights just before the attack would<br />
have to shift some of these southward<br />
into the final <strong>as</strong>sembly area designated<br />
for the Seventh on the attack left wing.<br />
The Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, slated to make<br />
the attack in the center, had begun its<br />
concentration in the Remagen-Mayen<br />
area of the Eifel <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> 26 November,<br />
but some of its armor w<strong>as</strong> coming from<br />
<strong>as</strong> far north <strong>as</strong> Munchen-Gladbach–one<br />
attack division, the 116th Panzer, would<br />
not complete detraining until 16 Decem-<br />
ber. The Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, which in<br />
Hitler’s mind and in OKW plans rep-<br />
resented the main effort and whose<br />
four SS panzer divisions were expected<br />
to pace the entire counteroffensive, by<br />
6 December had closed its armor in a<br />
zone stretching from west of Cologne<br />
to southwest of Bonn. The question<br />
remained whether the Sixth infantry<br />
divisions, some of which were in the<br />
Roer battle line, could be pried loose<br />
and moved south in time for H-hour.<br />
The Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong>, once intended to<br />
cover the north flank of the Sixth Panzer<br />
16 The several postponements of the German D-<br />
day are described in ETHINT–20, Hitler’s Conduct<br />
of the War (Rittmeister Dr. Wilhelm<br />
Scheidt) .<br />
17 The timing at the end of the German concentration<br />
is given unit by unit in Luttichau’s<br />
German Rail Communications and in his study<br />
entitled The Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive, Progressive<br />
Build-up and Operations, 11–19 December 1944.<br />
MS in OCMH files.
70 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
<strong>Army</strong> advance, had its hands full on the<br />
Roer front. Here t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no immedi-<br />
ate <strong>as</strong>sembly problem, although the<br />
army would have to plug the gaps left<br />
<strong>as</strong> divisions pulled out for the Ardennes.<br />
Ultimately, however, the Fifteenth<br />
might be reinforced from the OKW re-<br />
serve and join the attack. If the Fif-<br />
teenth <strong>Army</strong> is excluded the German<br />
attack front extended for 143 kilometers<br />
(89 miles). The main armored con-<br />
centration, however, would take place<br />
on a frontage of 97 kilometers (61<br />
miles) .<br />
The timetable for final <strong>as</strong>sembly in<br />
attack positions required three days, or<br />
better, three nights, since nearly all<br />
movement would be confined to hours<br />
of darkness. <strong>To</strong> prevent premature dis-<br />
closure by some unit wandering into<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sembly area, all formations except<br />
those already deployed on the original<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> front or immediately<br />
behind it were banned from crossing<br />
the <strong>Army</strong> Group B b<strong>as</strong>e line, twelve<br />
miles behind the front, until the final<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembly w<strong>as</strong> ordered by Hitler. Once<br />
across the b<strong>as</strong>e line every movement had<br />
to follow rigid timing. For further con-<br />
trol the infantry and armored divisions<br />
were each <strong>as</strong>signed two sectors for <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembly. Infantry Area I w<strong>as</strong> marked by<br />
a restraining line six miles from the<br />
front; Area 11 extended forward to<br />
points about two and a half to three<br />
miles from the front. Armor Area I<br />
actually w<strong>as</strong> e<strong>as</strong>t of the b<strong>as</strong>e line which<br />
served <strong>as</strong> the forward restraining line;<br />
Area 11 w<strong>as</strong> defined by a line six to ten<br />
miles from the front. The armored<br />
divisions, of course, would be strung out<br />
over greater distances than given <strong>here</strong><br />
but their <strong>as</strong>sault echelons would be<br />
fitted inside the two armored are<strong>as</strong>.<br />
Timing w<strong>as</strong> defined by coded days<br />
from the alphabet. Since O-Tag or D-<br />
day w<strong>as</strong> in fact 16 December the calen-<br />
dar dates can be given for what in the<br />
plan w<strong>as</strong> merely an undated sequence<br />
of events. On K-Tag (12 December)<br />
troops were alerted for movement. As<br />
yet they had no knowledge of the offen-<br />
sive; they would receive this information<br />
the night before the attack jumped off.<br />
By L-Tag (13 December) all units were<br />
supposed to have their forward detach-<br />
ments up to the b<strong>as</strong>e line; most of them<br />
did. During the night of 13 December<br />
the clockwork march to the final attack<br />
positions began. Those infantry divi-<br />
sions not already in place moved to the<br />
forward restraining line of their Area I.<br />
This also w<strong>as</strong> the night for the guns and<br />
howitzers belonging to army and VAK<br />
batteries to move. Using horses from<br />
the neighboring infantry artillery regi-<br />
ments, and liberally employing straw to<br />
muffle the wheels (just <strong>as</strong> had been done<br />
in 1918), the batteries were dragged<br />
into positions about five miles to the<br />
rear of the ultimate firing emplacements.<br />
The rocket projectors, e<strong>as</strong>ier to camou-<br />
flage, were hidden immediately behind<br />
their firing positions.<br />
On the night of the 14th the infantry<br />
divisions not already in place marched<br />
quietly into Area II. Motorized artillery<br />
went to <strong>as</strong>signed firing positions while<br />
low-flying German planes zoomed nois-<br />
ily over the American listening posts,<br />
or it w<strong>as</strong> dragged forward by horses. The<br />
rocket projector crews dug their pieces<br />
into the pits from which the prepara-<br />
tion for the attack would be fired. The<br />
tracked elements of the panzer division<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault groups churned into Armor Area<br />
II over roads which only two days earlier<br />
had been iced completely and along
PREPARATIONS 71<br />
which treacherous stretches remained.<br />
Wheeled units moved up to the Area I<br />
restraining line. This armored move-<br />
ment in the dark of night w<strong>as</strong> difficult<br />
indeed, but to avoid entanglement each<br />
panzer division had been given a road<br />
of its own and in no c<strong>as</strong>es did the dis-<br />
tance traveled during the two nights<br />
total more than fifty miles; for most it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> less. On the night of 15 December<br />
all formations marched to the line of<br />
departure or to forward combat posi-<br />
tions. It would appear that nearly all<br />
units were in place an hour or two be-<br />
fore H-hour, 0530 on the morning of<br />
16 December.<br />
Although the troops knew nothing of<br />
their mission until the night of the 15th,<br />
save what they could surmise, the com-<br />
manders had been given the picture in<br />
time to do some individual planning.<br />
By the end of the first week in Decem-<br />
ber all corps and division commanders<br />
knew what w<strong>as</strong> expected of them. Most<br />
of the division staffs seem to have been<br />
briefed on 10 December. Hitler re-<br />
ceived the commanders entrusted with<br />
the attack in two groups on the nights<br />
of 11 and 12 December. Most of the<br />
visitors seem to have been more im-<br />
pressed by the Fuehrer’s obvious phys-<br />
ical deterioration and the grim mien of<br />
the SS guards than by Hitler’s rambling<br />
recital of his deeds for Germany which<br />
constituted this l<strong>as</strong>t “briefing.” 18<br />
The forces <strong>as</strong>sembled. for the counter-<br />
offensive were the product of an almost<br />
psychotic drive by Hitler to put every<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t man, gun, and tank that could be<br />
stripped from some part of the declining<br />
German war establishment into the<br />
attack. Thirteen infantry and seven<br />
18 For the Hitler speeches of 11 and 12 December<br />
1944 see Gilbert, Hitler Directs His War, p. 157.<br />
armored divisions were ready for the<br />
initial <strong>as</strong>sault. Five divisions from the<br />
OKW reserve were on alert or actually<br />
en route to form the second wave, plus<br />
one armored and one mechanized brigade<br />
at reinforced strength. Approximately<br />
five additional divisions were<br />
listed in the OKW reserve, but their<br />
availability w<strong>as</strong> highly dubious. Some<br />
1,900 artillery pieces-including rocket<br />
projectors-were ready to support the<br />
attack. 19 The seven armored divisions in<br />
the initial echelon had about 970 tanks<br />
and armored <strong>as</strong>sault guns. The armored<br />
and mechanized elements of the immediate<br />
OKW reserve had another 450 to<br />
swell the armored attack. 20 If and when<br />
the Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong> joined in, the total<br />
force could be counted <strong>as</strong> twenty-nine<br />
infantry and twelve armored divisions.<br />
These divisions and heavy weapons<br />
might or might not suffice for the t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
at hand, but the total represented the<br />
best that the Wehrmacht could do. <strong>Of</strong><br />
the armored complement on the Western<br />
Front–2,567 tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
–<strong>Army</strong> Group B and OKW reserve had<br />
been given 2,168. About a third of this<br />
latter total would have to be left for<br />
the time being with the Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong><br />
to shore up the right-wing defenses in<br />
the Roer sector. Some four hundred<br />
19 On the German artillery preparations see<br />
MSS # B–311, Group B Artillery, Ardennes<br />
(General der Artillerie Karl Thoholte); B–347,<br />
Sixth SS Panzer <strong>Army</strong> Artillery (Generalleutnant<br />
Waffen-SS Walter Staudinger); B–759, Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, 15 December 1944–21 January 1945<br />
(Staudinger) .<br />
20 The very difficult t<strong>as</strong>k of evaluating and<br />
reconciling the various tank strengths given in<br />
individual (and fragmentary) German documents<br />
h<strong>as</strong> been ably done in Charles V. P. von Luttichau’s<br />
manuscript, Armor in the Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive<br />
(1952). MH. Cf., MS # P–059 (Mueller-Hillebrand)<br />
and the OB WEST KTB for 16 December<br />
1944
72<br />
tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns were all that<br />
remained to German divisions on the<br />
rest of the long Western Front. The<br />
hard-pressed armies on the E<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
Front likewise had been denied the<br />
armored materiel to replace their heavy<br />
autumn losses. At the beginning of December<br />
the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front total in operational<br />
tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns w<strong>as</strong> roughly<br />
1,500. 21 Despite Hitler’s personal<br />
emph<strong>as</strong>is on the power of the artillery<br />
arm and the very substantial number of<br />
tubes allocated for the offensive, the<br />
greatest portion of OB WEST artillery<br />
had to be left for corsetting w<strong>here</strong> armor<br />
and infantry had been pulled out, and,<br />
because of the scarcity of prime movers,<br />
a large number of batteries scheduled<br />
for the attack never got forward at all.<br />
The artillery flak and rocket projector<br />
support for the entire Western Front<br />
actually numbered 7,822 pieces on 16<br />
December.<br />
As proof that the Western Front’s<br />
armored strength in December 1944<br />
equaled that of the halcyon days at the<br />
beginning of the war, Hitler’s personal<br />
staff compiled a special report which<br />
showed that 2,594 tanks had taken part<br />
in the victorious 1940 campaign in the<br />
west. Nobody, it would appear, cared to<br />
look at comparative figures of air<br />
strengths in previous campaigns. In the<br />
Polish campaign some 50 German divisions<br />
had been given direct support by<br />
1,800 first-line aircraft. The Balkan<br />
campaign had seen 1,000 aircraft supporting<br />
17 divisions. The victorious advance<br />
into the Soviet Union had brought<br />
123 divisions into the line, with 2,500<br />
first-line attack planes in the air. 22 Now,<br />
21 See Luttichau’s Armor in the Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>-<br />
fensive, Table II.<br />
22 These figures have been gleaned from various<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
for the 25 divisions certain to be com-<br />
mitted in the Ardennes, Goering could<br />
promise only a thousand planes. By this<br />
time Hitler w<strong>as</strong> chary of Luftwaffe prom-<br />
ises and watered down this figure to 800-<br />
goo planes when he presented it to OB<br />
WEST. Hitler’s estimate would be met<br />
-but only for one day and that when<br />
the ground battle already had been<br />
decided.<br />
In December 1944, Germany w<strong>as</strong><br />
fighting a “poor man’s war” on the<br />
ground <strong>as</strong> in the air. 23 This must be<br />
remembered when <strong>as</strong>sessing the actual<br />
military potential of the divisions ar-<br />
rayed for the western offensive. Motor<br />
transport w<strong>as</strong> in sorry shape; the best-<br />
equipped divisions had about 80 percent<br />
of their vehicular tables of equipment,<br />
but many had only half the amount spec-<br />
ified in the tables. One of the best mech-<br />
anized divisions had sixty different types<br />
of automotive transport. Spare parts, a<br />
necessity in rough terrain and poor<br />
weather, hardly existed. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> only<br />
a handful of prime movers and heavy<br />
tank retrievers. Signal equipment w<strong>as</strong><br />
antiquated, worn-out, and sparse; the<br />
same held for engineer tools and ve-<br />
hicles. Antitank guns were scarce, the<br />
heavy losses in this weapon sustained in<br />
the summer and autumn dis<strong>as</strong>ters having<br />
never been made good. The German<br />
infantryman would have to defend him-<br />
self against the enemy tank with bravery<br />
and the bazooka, or so the field service<br />
regulations read.<br />
German military poverty w<strong>as</strong> now<strong>here</strong><br />
more apparent than in the stocks of<br />
ammunition and POL which had been<br />
secondary sources and are estimates only. Joint<br />
Intelligence Survey, Some Weaknesses in German<br />
Strategy and Organization (1946).<br />
23 MS # P–031b.
PREPARATIONS 73<br />
laboriously am<strong>as</strong>sed to support the<br />
attack. The Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> artillery<br />
commander, for example, had pleaded<br />
for twelve to fifteen units of artillery<br />
ammunition for the first ten days of<br />
operations. 24 On 16 December t<strong>here</strong> were<br />
only one and a half units with the <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group B guns and only two additional<br />
units in prospect. Although OB WEST<br />
appears to have estimated a daily POL<br />
consumption of 260,000 gallons per day<br />
for the Ardennes force, a number of the<br />
higher German quarterm<strong>as</strong>ters predicted<br />
that <strong>Army</strong> Group B would burn<br />
four times that amount on each day of<br />
the operation. 25 The armored divisions<br />
had in their vehicles and trains enough<br />
fuel for perhaps go to 100 miles of normal<br />
cruising, but battle in the Ardennes<br />
could hardly be considered normal travel.<br />
Though it is a commonplace that<br />
commanders and supply officers at the<br />
tactical level always want more shells<br />
and g<strong>as</strong>oline than they probably can use,<br />
t<strong>here</strong> is no question but that the Ardennes<br />
counteroffensive began on a logistical<br />
shoestring.<br />
On 15 December the intelligence<br />
staff at Rundstedt’s headquarters took<br />
one l<strong>as</strong>t look at the opposite side of the<br />
In the days just previous t<strong>here</strong><br />
seems to have been a growing une<strong>as</strong>iness<br />
that the Allies had recognized the impending<br />
attack and begun redeployment<br />
to meet it. Probably this w<strong>as</strong> no more<br />
than a nervous reaction to the continued<br />
24 The general problem of artillery and ammu-<br />
nition is discussed by General Thoholte, the artil-<br />
lery representative of <strong>Army</strong> Group B, in MS #B–311<br />
(Thoholte).<br />
25 A contemporary memorandum on the supply<br />
and POL status written by a Colonel Poleck is<br />
found in Schramm’s Merkbuch under the date of<br />
3 January 1945<br />
26 The Germar Intelligence Estimate for 15 Dec-<br />
ember 1944 is given in OB WEST KTB.<br />
postponement of D-day, for on the 15th<br />
the picture w<strong>as</strong> rosy. The U.S. 4th, 28th,<br />
106th, and 99th Infantry Divisions and<br />
their respective boundaries remained un-<br />
altered. The enemy “lack of interest”<br />
in this sector w<strong>as</strong> “underlined” by the<br />
paucity of aerial reconnaissance. The<br />
only new American division to arrive on<br />
the Western Front, the 75th, had been<br />
identified the day before in the Roer<br />
sector. For several days it had been<br />
recognized that the U.S. 12th <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group lacked “large operational re-<br />
serves.’’ Agents working in France had<br />
reported on 7 December that the 82d<br />
and 101st Airborne Divisions were <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembled at Mourmelon preparing for<br />
another airborne operation. These two<br />
divisions appeared to be the only U.S.<br />
forces uncommitted. The “rubber duck”<br />
operation on the VIII Corps front in<br />
which Special Troops from the 12th<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group simulated an additional<br />
division had been reflected for some days<br />
on German situation maps by a question<br />
mark. On the 15th, however, OB WEST<br />
w<strong>as</strong> satisfied that no new division existed<br />
and the question mark disappeared.<br />
The 4th and 28th Infantry Divisions<br />
were known to be exhausted and it w<strong>as</strong><br />
doubted that they were up to strength.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> appeared to be relatively little<br />
armor opposite the three <strong>as</strong>sault armies,<br />
probably no more than 370 tanks at the<br />
maximum. Although restrictions on<br />
patrolling had limited any recent infor-<br />
mation on exact tactical locations, t<strong>here</strong><br />
existed a complete file carefully built<br />
up since September. New arrivals on the<br />
Ardennes front had tended to occupy<br />
the same positions <strong>as</strong> their predecessors,<br />
and on this habit the Germans counted.<br />
The three communications intelligence<br />
companies operating under <strong>Army</strong> Group
74 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
B were ple<strong>as</strong>ed to report that American<br />
carelessness in the use of radio and commercial<br />
telephone nets w<strong>as</strong> up to par,<br />
and that no reinforcements were en<br />
route to the Ardennes. 27<br />
Across the line intelligence staffs were<br />
equally placid-although with less re<strong>as</strong>on.<br />
The 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group G–2 situation<br />
map of 15 December showed no<br />
changes. For the sector from the Moselle<br />
to Monschau only five German divisions<br />
appeared, with a sixth apparently withdrawing<br />
from the Eifel. The Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> symbol still crowded the dot<br />
on the map representing Cologne. All<br />
panzer divisions, except the 9th SS and<br />
the 12th SS, which bore question marks,<br />
27 MS # P–038, German Radio Intelligence (1950).<br />
remained in locations north of the<br />
Eifel. 28<br />
In the German camp t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> one<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t hitch. On 15 December Model <strong>as</strong>ked<br />
Rundstedt to postpone the attack, but<br />
the latter ruled that O-Tag would be<br />
<strong>as</strong> scheduled and so informed Fuehrer<br />
headquarters. At 1530 an officer named<br />
Waizenegger telephoned from OKW to<br />
give Hitler’s confirmation of Rundstedt’s<br />
decision; the liaison officers waiting with<br />
Rundstedt’s staff departed for their com-<br />
mands at once, bearing the attack orders.<br />
And at midnight on the 15th the officer<br />
keeping the OB WEST War Diary made<br />
the l<strong>as</strong>t entry of that date: “<strong>To</strong>morrow<br />
brings the beginning of a new chapter<br />
in the Campaign In the West.”<br />
28 This situation map may be found in Thomp-<br />
son’s American Intelligence on the German<br />
Counteroffensive.
CHAPTER V<br />
The Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> Attack<br />
On the night of 15 December German<br />
company commanders gave their men<br />
the watchword which had come from<br />
the Fuehrer himself: “Forward to and<br />
over the Meuse!” The objective w<strong>as</strong><br />
Antwerp. Hitler’s concept of the Big<br />
Solution had prevailed; the enemy w<strong>as</strong><br />
not to be beaten e<strong>as</strong>t of the Meuse but<br />
encircled by a turning movement be-<br />
yond that river. The main effort would<br />
be made by Dietrich’s Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> on the north wing, with orders to<br />
cross the Meuse on both sides of Liége,<br />
wheel north, and strike for the Albert<br />
Canal, fanning out the while to form a<br />
front extending from Ma<strong>as</strong>tricht to<br />
Antwerp. Meanwhile the infantry divi-<br />
sions to the rear of the armored columns<br />
would form the north shoulder of the<br />
initial advance and a subsequent block-<br />
ing position e<strong>as</strong>t of the Meuse along the<br />
Vesdre River. Eventually, or so Hitler<br />
intended, the Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong> would<br />
advance to take a station protecting the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> right and rear.<br />
Manteuffel’s Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, ini-<br />
tially acting <strong>as</strong> the center, had the mis-<br />
sion of crossing the Meuse to the south<br />
of the Sixth, but because the river<br />
angled away to the southwest might be<br />
expected to cross a few hours later than<br />
its armored partner on the right. Once<br />
across the Meuse, Manteuffel had the<br />
mission of preventing an Allied counter-<br />
attack against Dietrich’s left and rear by<br />
holding the line An twerp-Brussels-<br />
Namur-Dinant. The left wing of the<br />
counteroffensive, composed of infantry<br />
and mechanized divisions belonging to<br />
Brandenberger’s Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, had<br />
orders to push to the Meuse, unwinding<br />
a cordon of infantry and artillery facing<br />
south and southwest, t<strong>here</strong>after anchor-<br />
ing the southern German flank on the<br />
angle formed by the Semois and the<br />
Meuse. Also, the Fuehrer had expressed<br />
the wish that the first segment of the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> cordon be pushed <strong>as</strong> far<br />
south <strong>as</strong> Luxembourg City if possible.<br />
What course operations were to take<br />
once Antwerp w<strong>as</strong> captured is none too<br />
clear. 1 Indeed no detailed plans existed<br />
for this ph<strong>as</strong>e. T<strong>here</strong> are numerous indi-<br />
cations that the field commanders did<br />
not view the Big Solution too seriously<br />
but fixed their eyes on the seizure of the<br />
Meuse bridgeheads rather than on the<br />
capture of Antwerp. Probably Hitler<br />
had good re<strong>as</strong>on for the final admoni-<br />
tion, on 15 December, that the attack w<strong>as</strong><br />
not to begin the northward wheel until<br />
the Meuse w<strong>as</strong> crossed.<br />
Dietrich’s Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, selected<br />
to make the main effort, had a distinct<br />
political complexion. Its armored divi-<br />
sions all belonged to the Waffen SS, its<br />
1 Jodl, while a prisoner at Nuremberg, said that<br />
once the Antwerp line w<strong>as</strong> reached the subse-<br />
quent German operations would aim at “neutral-<br />
izing” the Allied armies to the e<strong>as</strong>t.
76 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
commander w<strong>as</strong> an old party member,<br />
and when regular Wehrmacht officers<br />
were <strong>as</strong>signed to help in the attack prep-<br />
arations they were transferred to the SS<br />
rolls. Hitler’s early plans speak of the<br />
Sixth SS Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, although on 16<br />
December the army still did not bear<br />
the SS appellation in any official way, and<br />
it is clear that the Sixth w<strong>as</strong> accorded<br />
the responsibility and honor of the main<br />
effort simply because Hitler felt he could<br />
depend on the SS.<br />
GENERAL DIETRICH<br />
Josef “Sepp” Dietrich had the appro-<br />
priate political qualifications to ensure<br />
Hitler’s trust but, on his military record,<br />
hardly those meriting command of the<br />
main striking force in the great counter-<br />
offensive. By profession a butcher,<br />
Dietrich had learned something of the<br />
soldier’s trade in World War I, rising to<br />
the rank of sergeant, a rank which at-<br />
tached to him perpetually in the minds<br />
of the aristocratic members of the Ger-<br />
man General Staff. He had accompanied<br />
Hitler on the march to the Feldherrn-<br />
halle in 1923 and by 1940 had risen to<br />
command the Adolf Hitler Division,<br />
raised from Hitler’s bodyguard regi-<br />
ment, in the western campaign. After<br />
gaining considerable reputation in<br />
Russia, Dietrich w<strong>as</strong> brought to the west<br />
in 1944 and t<strong>here</strong> commanded a corps<br />
in the great tank battles at Caen. He<br />
managed to hang onto his reputation<br />
during the subsequent retreats and<br />
finally w<strong>as</strong> selected personally by Hitler<br />
to command the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. Un-<br />
couth, despised by most of the higher<br />
officer cl<strong>as</strong>s, and with no great intelli-<br />
gence, Dietrich had a deserved reputa-<br />
tion for bravery and w<strong>as</strong> known <strong>as</strong> a<br />
tenacious and driving division and corps<br />
commander. Whether he could com-<br />
mand an army remained to be proven.<br />
The attack front <strong>as</strong>signed the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, Monschau to Krewinkel,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> narrower than that of its southern<br />
partner because terrain in this sector<br />
w<strong>as</strong> poor at the breakthrough points and<br />
would not offer cross-country tank going<br />
until the Hohes Venn w<strong>as</strong> p<strong>as</strong>sed. The<br />
initial <strong>as</strong>sault wave consisted of one ar-<br />
mored and one infantry corps. On the<br />
south flank the I SS Panzer Corps<br />
(Generalleutnant der Waffen-SS Her-<br />
mann Priess) had two armored divisions,<br />
the 1st SS Panzer and the 12th SS Pan-<br />
zer, plus three infantry divisions, the 3d<br />
Parachute, the 12th Volks Grenadier,<br />
and the 277th Volks Grenadier. On the<br />
north flank the LXVII Corps (General<br />
der Infanterie Otto Hitzfeld) had only<br />
two infantry divisions, the 326th and<br />
246th Volks Grenadier, The doctrinal<br />
question <strong>as</strong> to whether tanks or infantry<br />
should take the lead, still moot in Ger-
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 77<br />
man military thinking after all the years<br />
of war, had been raised when Dietrich<br />
proposed to make the initial break-<br />
through with his two tank divisions. He<br />
w<strong>as</strong> overruled by Model, however, and<br />
the three infantry divisions were given<br />
the mission of punching a hole on either<br />
side of Udenbreth. T<strong>here</strong>after the in-<br />
fantry w<strong>as</strong> to swing <strong>as</strong>ide, moving north-<br />
west to block the three roads which led<br />
south from Verviers and onto the route<br />
the armor would be taking in its d<strong>as</strong>h<br />
for Liége. Hitzfeld’s corps had a less<br />
ambitious program: to attack on either<br />
side of Monschau, get across the Mut-<br />
zenich-Elsenborn road, then turn north<br />
and west to establish a hard flank on the<br />
line Simmerath-Eupen-Limburg. All<br />
five of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> infantry<br />
divisions ultimately would wind up, or<br />
so the plan read, forming a shoulder on<br />
an e<strong>as</strong>t-west line from Rötgen (north of<br />
Monschau) to Liége. Under this flank<br />
cover the armored divisions of the I SS<br />
Panzer Corps would roll west, followed<br />
by the second armored wave, the II SS<br />
Panzer Corps (General der Waffen-SS<br />
Willi Bittrich) composed of the 2d and<br />
9th SS Panzer Divisions.<br />
Dietrich’s staff had selected five roads<br />
to carry the westward advance, the armor<br />
being <strong>as</strong>signed priority rights on the four<br />
southernmost. Actually it w<strong>as</strong> expected<br />
that the 1st SS and 12th SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sions would use only one road each.<br />
(These two routes ran through the 99th<br />
Infantry Division sector.) Although the<br />
planning principle <strong>as</strong> regards the ar-<br />
mored divisions w<strong>as</strong> to hold the reins<br />
loose and let them run <strong>as</strong> far and <strong>as</strong> f<strong>as</strong>t<br />
<strong>as</strong> they could, the Sixth Panzer did have<br />
a timetable: one day for penetration and<br />
breakout, one day to get the armor over<br />
the Hohes Venn, the Meuse to be<br />
reached by the evening of the third day,<br />
and crossings to be secured by<br />
the fourth. 2<br />
This army w<strong>as</strong> relatively well<br />
equipped and trained. Most of its ar-<br />
mor had been out of combat for some<br />
time and the horde of replacements had<br />
some degree of training in night move-<br />
ment and fighting. The 1st and 2d SS<br />
had not been loaded with Luftwaffe and<br />
over-age replacements <strong>as</strong> had the other<br />
divisions. The artillery complement of<br />
the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> very heavy,<br />
albeit limited in mobility by the paucity<br />
of self-propelled battalions. The four<br />
armored divisions had about 500 tanks<br />
and armored <strong>as</strong>sault guns, including go<br />
Tigers (Mark VI). Lacking were two<br />
things which would markedly affect the<br />
operations of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
once battle w<strong>as</strong> joined. T<strong>here</strong> were few<br />
trained engineer companies and these<br />
had little power equipment. The infan-<br />
try lacked their full complement of <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault guns, a weapon on which the<br />
German rifle platoon had learned to lean<br />
in the <strong>as</strong>sault; only the 3d Parachute w<strong>as</strong><br />
fully armed with this critical infantry<br />
weapon. 3<br />
The 99th Division Sector<br />
The southern portion of the V Corps<br />
front w<strong>as</strong> occupied by the 99th Infantry<br />
Division (Maj. Gen. Walter E. Lauer) ,<br />
2 MS # A–924, Operations of Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>,<br />
1944–45 (SS Generalmajor Fritz Kraemer).<br />
Kraemer w<strong>as</strong> chief of staff of Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
3 MSS # B–311 (Thoholte) and P–109a, Ardennes<br />
Follow Up–3d SS Panzer Grenadier Regiment<br />
(Oberstleutant Waffen-SS Guenther Wisliceny) ; see<br />
also ETHINT–21, Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> in the Ar-<br />
dennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive (Generalmajor (Waffen-SS) Fritz<br />
Kraemer) and ETHINT–61, Tank Maintenance,<br />
Ardennes (General der Panzertruppen Horst<br />
Stumpff).
78 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
which had arrived on the Continent in<br />
November 1944 and been placed in this<br />
defensive sector to acquire experience?<br />
The 99th Division front (left to right)<br />
extended from Monschau and Hofen to<br />
the railroad just north of Lanzerath, a<br />
distance of about nineteen miles. <strong>To</strong> the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t lay the Germans in the West Wall<br />
pillbox line. The frontage <strong>as</strong>signed an<br />
untried division at first thought seems<br />
excessive, but the V Corps commander<br />
wished to free <strong>as</strong> much of his striking<br />
power <strong>as</strong> possible for use in the sched-<br />
uled attack to seize the Roer dams;<br />
furthermore the nature of the terrain<br />
appeared little likely to attract a major<br />
German attack. (Map II)<br />
In the extreme northern portion of<br />
the sector, around Hofen, the ground<br />
w<strong>as</strong> studded with open hills, to the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of which lay a section of the Monschau<br />
Forest. Only a short distance to the<br />
south of Hofen the lines of the 99th<br />
entered this forest, continuing to run<br />
through a long timber belt until the<br />
boundary between the V and VIII Corps<br />
w<strong>as</strong> reached at the Losheim Gap. The<br />
4 The records of the 99th Division, for the<br />
battle described in this chapter, are quite com-<br />
plete and detailed. B<strong>as</strong>ic documents are: 99th<br />
Div AAR and C–3 Jnl; AAR’s and Unit Jnls of<br />
the 393d. 394th. and 395th Inf Regis; 741st Tank<br />
Bn AAR; AAR’s of 639th and 413th AAA Bns;<br />
254th Engr Combat Bn AAR and Jnl; 801st<br />
Tank Destroyer Bn AAR; 371st FA Bn AAR;<br />
and 799th Ord Co AAR. This operation w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
subject of studies by participants while in Cl<strong>as</strong>ses<br />
Nos. 1 and 2, Advanced Infantry <strong>Of</strong>ficers Course,<br />
Fort Benning, Ga. (see especially those by Majors<br />
Ben W. Legare, J. B. Kemp, and T. J. Gendron<br />
and Capt. Wesley J. Simmons). The then com-<br />
mander of the 99th Division h<strong>as</strong> written the official<br />
division history; see Major General Walter E.<br />
Lauer, Battle Babies: The Story of the 99th In-<br />
fantry Division in World War II (Baton Rouge:<br />
<strong>Military</strong> Press of Louisiana, Inc., 1951) . American<br />
combat interviews are another useful source.<br />
thick woods in the sector were tangled<br />
with rocky gorges, little streams, and<br />
sharp hills. The division supply lines<br />
began <strong>as</strong> fairly substantial all-weather<br />
roads, then dwindled, <strong>as</strong> they ap-<br />
proached the forward positions, to<br />
muddy ruts following the firebreaks and<br />
logging trails. Except for the open area<br />
in the neighborhood of Hofen, visibility<br />
w<strong>as</strong> limited and fields of fire restricted.<br />
Any clearing operation in the deep<br />
woods would only give away the Ameri-<br />
can positions. Although terrain seemed<br />
equally difficult for defense or offense,<br />
this balance would exist only so long <strong>as</strong><br />
the defender could retain control over<br />
his units in the woods and provide some<br />
sort of cordon to check infiltration. The<br />
nature of the ground and the length of<br />
the front made such a cordon impossible;<br />
the 99th could maintain no more than a<br />
series of strongpoints, with unoccupied<br />
and undefended gaps between.<br />
Three roads were of primary impor-<br />
tance in and e<strong>as</strong>t of the division area.<br />
In the north a main paved road led from<br />
Hofen through the Monschau Forest,<br />
then divided <strong>as</strong> it emerged on the e<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
ern edge (this fork beyond the forest<br />
would have some tactical importance) . A<br />
second road ran laterally behind the<br />
division center and right wing, leaving<br />
the Hofen road at the tiny village of<br />
Wahlerscheid, continuing south through<br />
the twin hamlets of Rocherath and Krin-<br />
kelt, then intersecting a main e<strong>as</strong>t-west<br />
road at Bullingen. This paved highway<br />
entered the division zone from the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
at Losheimergraben and ran west to<br />
Malmedy by way of Bullingen and But-<br />
genbach. As a result, despite the poverty<br />
of roads inside the forest belt w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
forward positions of the 99th Division<br />
lay, the division sector could be entered
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 79<br />
from the e<strong>as</strong>t along roads tapping either<br />
flank.<br />
From 8 December on the 99th Divi-<br />
sion had been preparing for its first<br />
commitment in a large-scale operation,<br />
repairing roads; laying additional tele-<br />
phone wire, and shifting its guns for the<br />
V Corps attack toward the Roer dams.<br />
In addition a new supply road w<strong>as</strong> con-<br />
structed from the Krinkelt area to the<br />
sector held by the 395th Infantry. The<br />
2d Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong> to p<strong>as</strong>s through<br />
the 99th, then the latter would attack to<br />
cover the southern flank of the 2d Divi-<br />
sion advance. As scheduled, the 2d Divi-<br />
sion p<strong>as</strong>sed through the 99th Division on<br />
13 December, beginning its attack on a<br />
narrow front toward Dreiborn, located<br />
SNOW SCENE NEAR KRINKELT<br />
on the northern fork of the Hofen road<br />
beyond the Monschau Forest.<br />
The dispositions of the 99th Division<br />
were these: On the north flank-the 3d<br />
Battalion, 395th Infantry, occupied the<br />
Höfen area, with the 38th Cavalry<br />
Squadron on the left and the 99th<br />
Reconnaissance Troop on the right. The<br />
ground <strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> open and rolling, the<br />
3d Battalion well dug in and possessed<br />
of good fields of fire. Next in line to the<br />
south, the 2d Division w<strong>as</strong> making its<br />
attack on a thrust line running north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tward, its supply route following the<br />
section of the Hofen road which ran<br />
through the forest to the fork. The re-<br />
maining two battalions of the 395th re-<br />
sumed the 99th Division front, succeeded
80 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
to the south, in turn, by the 393d Infan-<br />
try and the 394th. Conforming to the<br />
wooded contour, the elements of the 99th<br />
Division south of the 2d Division attack-<br />
ing column occupied a slight salient<br />
bellying out from the flanks.<br />
Two battalions of the 99th Division<br />
(the 1st and 2d of the 395th) took part<br />
in the attack begun on 13 December,<br />
although other elements of the division<br />
put on demonstrations to create some<br />
diversion to their immediate front. The<br />
2d Battalion, 395th, on the right of the<br />
2d Division jumped off in deep snow and<br />
bitter cold in an attack intended to swing<br />
north, wedge through the West Wall<br />
bunker line, and seize Harperscheid on<br />
the southern fork of the road beyond the<br />
forest. The advance on the 13th went<br />
well; then, <strong>as</strong> the attack hit the German<br />
bunkers and enemy guns and mortars<br />
ranged in, the pace began to slow. By<br />
16 December, however, several impor-<br />
tant positions were in American hands<br />
and it seemed that a breakthrough w<strong>as</strong><br />
in the making despite bad weather, poor<br />
visibility, and difficult terrain.<br />
The German troops manning the<br />
West Wall positions in front of the 2d<br />
and 99th Divisions had been identified<br />
prior to the 13 December attack <strong>as</strong><br />
coming from the 277th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division and the 294th Regiment of the<br />
18th Volks Grenadier Division. An addi-<br />
tional unit w<strong>as</strong> identified on the second<br />
day of the offensive when prisoners were<br />
taken who carried the pay books of the<br />
326th Volks Grenadier Division. Al-<br />
though this w<strong>as</strong> the only indication of<br />
any German reinforcement, American<br />
commanders and intelligence officers<br />
anticipated that a counterattack shortly<br />
would be made against the shoulders of<br />
the 2d Division corridor held by the<br />
99th, but that this would be limited in<br />
nature and probably no more than regi-<br />
mental in strength. The immediate and<br />
natural reaction, t<strong>here</strong>fore, to the Ger-<br />
man attack launched against the 99th<br />
Division on the morning of the fourth<br />
day of the V Corps offensive (16 Decem-<br />
ber) w<strong>as</strong> that this w<strong>as</strong> no more than the<br />
anticipated riposte.<br />
The Initial Attack, 16 December<br />
<strong>To</strong> the south of the 393d Infantry, the<br />
394th (Col. Don Riley) held a defensive<br />
sector marking the right flank terminus<br />
for both the 99th Division and V Corps.<br />
The 6,500-yard front ran along the In-<br />
ternational Highway from a point west<br />
of Neuhof, in enemy hands, south to<br />
Losheimergraben. Nearly the entire line<br />
lay inside the forest belt. On the right a<br />
two-mile gap existed between the regi-<br />
ment and the forward locations of the<br />
14th Cavalry Group. <strong>To</strong> patrol this gap<br />
the regimental I and R Platoon held an<br />
outpost on the high ground slightly<br />
northwest of Lanzerath and overlooking<br />
the road from that village. Thence<br />
hourly jeep patrols worked across the gap<br />
to meet patrols dispatched by the cavalry<br />
on the other side of the corps boundary.<br />
Acutely aware of the sensitive nature of<br />
this southern flank, General Lauer had<br />
stationed his division reserve (3d Bat-<br />
talion of the 394th) near the Ruchholz<br />
railroad station in echelon behind the<br />
right of the two battalions in the line.<br />
The fateful position of the 394th<br />
would bring against it the main effort of<br />
the I SS Panzer Corps and, indeed, that<br />
of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. Two roads ran<br />
obliquely through the regimental area.<br />
One, a main road, intersected the north-<br />
south International Highway (and the
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 81<br />
forward line held by the 394th) at<br />
Losheimergraben and continued north-<br />
westward through Bullingen and But-<br />
genbach to Malmédy. The other, a<br />
secondary road but generally p<strong>as</strong>sable in<br />
winter, branched from the International<br />
Highway north of Lanzerath, and curved<br />
west through Buchholz, Honsfeld, Schop-<br />
pen, and Faymonville, roughly parallel-<br />
ing the main road to the north.<br />
<strong>Of</strong> the five westward roads <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
the I SS Panzer Corps the two above were<br />
most important. The main road to Bul-<br />
lingen and Malmedy would be called<br />
“C” on the German maps; the secondary<br />
road would be named “D.” These two<br />
roads had been selected <strong>as</strong> routes for the<br />
main armored columns, first for the<br />
panzer elements of the I SS Panzer<br />
Corps, then to carry the tank groups of<br />
the II SS Panzer Corps composing the<br />
second wave of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>’s<br />
attack. But since the commitment of ar-<br />
mored spearheads during the battle to<br />
break through the American main line<br />
of resistance had been ruled out, the<br />
initial German attempt to effect a pene-<br />
tration would turn on the efforts of the<br />
three infantry divisions loaned the I<br />
SS Panzer Corps for this purpose only.<br />
The 277th Volks Grenadier Division,<br />
aligned opposite the American 393d In-<br />
fantry, had a mission which would turn<br />
its attack north of the axis selected for<br />
the armored advance. Nonetheless, suc-<br />
cess or failure by the 277th would deter-<br />
mine the extent to which the tank routes<br />
might be menaced by American inter-<br />
vention from the north. The twin towns,<br />
Rocherath-Krinkelt, for example, com-<br />
manded the road which cut across–and<br />
thus could be used to block–the<br />
Bullingen road, route C.<br />
The two infantry divisions composing<br />
the I SS Panzer Corps center and south<br />
wing were directly charged with open-<br />
ing the chief armored routes. The 12th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division, regarded by<br />
the Sixth <strong>Army</strong> staff <strong>as</strong> the best of the<br />
infantry divisions, had <strong>as</strong> its axis of at-<br />
tack the Bullingen road (route C) ; its<br />
immediate objective w<strong>as</strong> the crossroads<br />
point of departure for the westward<br />
highway at Losheimergraben and the<br />
opening beyond the thick Gerolstein<br />
Forest section of the woods belt. The ul-<br />
timate objective for the 12th Division<br />
attack w<strong>as</strong> the attainment of a line at<br />
Nidrum and Weywertz, eight airline<br />
miles beyond the American front, at<br />
which point the division w<strong>as</strong> to face<br />
north <strong>as</strong> part of the infantry cordon cov-<br />
ering the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> flank. The<br />
3d Parachute Division, forming the left<br />
wing in the initial disposition for the at-<br />
tack, had a zone of advance roughly fol-<br />
lowing the southern shoulder of the<br />
Honsfeld or D route. The area selected<br />
for the breakthrough attempt comprised<br />
the north half of the U.S. 14th Cavalry<br />
Group sector and took in most of the gap<br />
between the cavalry and the 99th Divi-<br />
sion. In the first hours of the advance,<br />
then, the 3d Parachute Division would<br />
be striking against the 14th Cavalry<br />
Group in the Krewinkel-Berterath area.<br />
But the final objective of the 3d Para-<br />
chute attack w<strong>as</strong> ten miles to the north-<br />
west, the line Schoppen-Eibertingen on<br />
route D. The 3d Parachute axis thus<br />
extended through the right of the 99th<br />
Division.<br />
The decision <strong>as</strong> to exactly when the<br />
two panzer divisions would be com-<br />
mitted in exploitation of the penetra-<br />
tions achieved by the infantry w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
matter to be decided by the commanders<br />
of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> and <strong>Army</strong>
82 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Group B <strong>as</strong> the attack developed. Ar-<br />
mored infantry kampfgruppen from the<br />
12th SS Panzer Division and 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division were <strong>as</strong>sembled close be-<br />
hind the infantry divisions, in part <strong>as</strong><br />
reinforcements for the breakthrough<br />
forces, in part because none of the Volks<br />
Grenadier units were used to close co-<br />
operation with armor.<br />
Considerable reshuffling had been<br />
needed in the nights prior to 16 Decem-<br />
ber to bring the I SS Panzer Corps<br />
toward its line of departure and to feed<br />
the infantry into the West Wall positions<br />
formerly occupied by the 277th Division.<br />
All this w<strong>as</strong> completed by 0400 on the<br />
morning set for the attack (except for<br />
the reconnaissance battalion which failed<br />
to arrive in the 3d Parachute Division<br />
lines), and the bulk of the two artillery<br />
corps and two Volks Werfer brigades<br />
furnishing the artillery reinforcement<br />
w<strong>as</strong> in position. None of the three army<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault gun battalions, one for each at-<br />
tacking division, had yet appeared. The<br />
German artillery, from the 75-mm. in-<br />
fantry accompanying howitzers up to the<br />
210-mm. heavy battalions, were deployed<br />
in three groupments, by weight and<br />
range, charged respectively with direct<br />
support of the attacking infantry, coun-<br />
terbattery, and long-distance fire for<br />
destruction.<br />
The first thunderclap of the m<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
German guns and Werfers at 0530 on 16<br />
December w<strong>as</strong> heard by outposts of the<br />
394th Infantry <strong>as</strong> “outgoing mail,” fire<br />
from friendly guns, but in a matter of<br />
minutes the entire regimental area w<strong>as</strong><br />
aware that something most unusual had<br />
occurred. Intelligence reports had lo-<br />
cated only two horse-drawn artillery<br />
pieces opposite one of the American line<br />
battalions; after a bombardment of an<br />
hour and five minutes the battalion<br />
executive officer reported, “They sure<br />
worked those horses to death.” But until<br />
the German infantry were actually<br />
sighted moving through the trees, the<br />
American reaction to the searchlights<br />
and exploding shells w<strong>as</strong> that the enemy<br />
simply w<strong>as</strong> feinting in answer to the 2d<br />
and 99th attack up north. In common<br />
with the rest of the 99th the line troops<br />
of the 394th had profited by the earlier<br />
quiet on this front to improve their posi-<br />
tions by log roofing; so c<strong>as</strong>ualties during<br />
the early morning barrage were few.<br />
The German infantry delayed in fol-<br />
lowing up the artillery preparation,<br />
which ended about 0700. On this part of<br />
the forest front the enemy line of de-<br />
parture w<strong>as</strong> inside the woods. The prob-<br />
lem, then, w<strong>as</strong> to get the attack rolling<br />
through the undergrowth, American<br />
barbed wire, and mine fields immedi-<br />
ately to the German front. The groping<br />
nature of the attack w<strong>as</strong> enhanced by<br />
the heavy mist hanging low in the forest.<br />
The 2d Battalion, on the north flank,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> more directly exposed since a road<br />
led into the woods position from Neuhof.<br />
At this point, close to the regimental<br />
boundary, the battle w<strong>as</strong> carried by a<br />
fusilier company attached to the 990th<br />
Regiment of the 277th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division. The fusiliers succeeded in<br />
reaching the 2d Battalion lines about<br />
0800 but were driven off by small arms<br />
fire and artillery.<br />
In midafternoon the 12th SS Panzer<br />
Division, waiting for the infantry to<br />
open the road to the International High-<br />
way, apparently loaned a few tanks to<br />
carry the fusiliers into the attack. 5 Be-<br />
5 The action. in this sector h<strong>as</strong> been covered<br />
by General Priess in MS # A–877, Commitment<br />
of the I SS Panzer Corps During the Ardennes
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 83<br />
hind a smoke screen the tanks rolled out<br />
of Neuhof. An American sergeant<br />
spotted this move and with a sound-<br />
powered telephone brought friendly ar-<br />
tillery into play. High explosive stopped<br />
the tanks in their tracks. A few infantry-<br />
men got through to the forest positions<br />
occupied by the 2d Battalion. T<strong>here</strong> an<br />
unknown BAR man atop a log hut<br />
“raised hell with the Krauts” and the at-<br />
tack petered out. The 2d Battalion, dur-<br />
ing this day, never w<strong>as</strong> really pressed. The<br />
chief enemy thrusts had gone to the<br />
north, w<strong>here</strong> the right flank of the 393d<br />
Infantry w<strong>as</strong> hit hard by the 277th Divi-<br />
sion, and to the south, against the center<br />
and refused right flank of the 394th. No<br />
word of events elsew<strong>here</strong> on the 394th<br />
front reached the 2d Battalion command<br />
post, but the appearance of German in-<br />
fantry in the woods along the northern<br />
regimental boundary gave a clue to the<br />
penetration developing t<strong>here</strong>, and the<br />
left company of the 2d Battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
pulled back somewhat <strong>as</strong> flank protec-<br />
tion,<br />
The initial enemy action along the<br />
394th Infantry center and south flank<br />
w<strong>as</strong> intended to punch holes through<br />
which the panzer columns might de-<br />
bouch onto the Bullingen and Honsfeld<br />
roads. The prominent terrain feature,<br />
in the first hours of the fight, w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
<strong>Of</strong>fensive, 16 December 1944–25 January 1945<br />
(General der Waffen–SS Hermann Priess. Cf. MS<br />
# P–109d, Ardennes Follow Up (Oberst der<br />
Schutzpolizei F. W. Bock), and MS # B–577, I<br />
SS Panzer Corps, 15 October–16 December 1944<br />
(Oberst der Waffen-SS Rudolf Lehman). These<br />
are fragments extant of III / SSPz Gr Regt 25, KTB<br />
Nr. 2. For the story of the 277th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division, see MS # B–273, 277th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division, November 1944–January 1945 (General-<br />
major Wilhelm Viebig), and MS # B–465, 3d<br />
Panzer Grenadier Division, 16–28 December 1944<br />
(Generalmajor Walter Denkert) .<br />
branch railroad line which crossed the<br />
frontier just north of Losheim and then<br />
twined back and forth, over and under<br />
the Bullingen-Malmédy highway west-<br />
ward. During the autumn retreat the<br />
Germans themselves had destroyed the<br />
bridge which carried the Bullingen road<br />
over the railroad tracks north of Los-<br />
heim. <strong>To</strong> the west the highway overp<strong>as</strong>s<br />
on the Lanzerath-Losheimergraben sec.<br />
tion of the International Highway had<br />
also been demolished. The crossroads<br />
at Losheimergraben would have to be<br />
taken if the German tanks were to have<br />
quick and e<strong>as</strong>y access to the Bullingen<br />
road, but the approach to Losheimer-<br />
graben, whether from Losheim or Lan-<br />
zerath, w<strong>as</strong> denied to all but infantry<br />
until such time <strong>as</strong> the railroad track<br />
could be captured and the highway over-<br />
p<strong>as</strong>ses restored.<br />
The line of track also indicated the<br />
axis for the advance of the left wing of<br />
the 12th Volks Grenadier Division and,<br />
across the lines, marked a general bound-<br />
ary between the 1st and 3d Battalions of<br />
the 394th Infantry. When the barrage<br />
lifted, about 0700, the <strong>as</strong>sault regiments<br />
of the 12th Division already were mov-<br />
ing toward the American positions. The<br />
48th Grenadier Regiment, in the north,<br />
headed through the woods for the<br />
Losheimergraben crossroads. Fallen<br />
trees, barbed wire, and mines,<br />
compounded with an almost complete<br />
ignorance of the forest trails, slowed<br />
this advance. The attack on the left,<br />
by the 27th Fuesilier Regiment, had<br />
e<strong>as</strong>ier going, with much open country<br />
and a series of draws leading directly<br />
to the track and the American positions.<br />
The 3d Battalion (Maj. Norman A.<br />
Moore), to the south and west of the 1st<br />
Battalion position at Losheimergraben,
84 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
first encountered the enemy. About 0745<br />
L Company, at the Buchholz station, had<br />
taken advantage of the lull in the shell-<br />
ing and w<strong>as</strong> just lining up for breakf<strong>as</strong>t<br />
when figures were seen approaching<br />
through the fog, marching along the<br />
track in a column of two’s. First thought<br />
to be friendly troops, the Germans were<br />
almost at the station before recognition<br />
brought on a fusilade of American bul-<br />
lets. The enemy scattered for the box-<br />
cars outside the station or sought shelter<br />
in ditches along the right of way and a<br />
close-quarters fire fight began. A 3-inch<br />
tank destroyer systematically worked<br />
over the cars, while the American mor-<br />
tar crews raked the area beside the track.<br />
LOSHEIMERGRABEN<br />
A few Germans reached the roundhouse<br />
near the station, but Sgt. Savino Trava-<br />
lini, leader of the antitank platoon, went<br />
forward with a bazooka, fired in enough<br />
rounds to flush the fusiliers, then cut<br />
them down with his rifle <strong>as</strong> they broke<br />
into the open. (Sergeant Travalini w<strong>as</strong><br />
awarded a battlefield commission <strong>as</strong> sec-<br />
ond lieutenant.) K Company, ordered up<br />
to reinforce the outnumbered defenders<br />
at the station, arrived in time to take a<br />
hand in the affray. By noon the Germans<br />
had been repelled, leaving behind about<br />
seventy-five dead; L Company had suf-<br />
fered twenty-five or thirty c<strong>as</strong>ualties.<br />
As a result of the stubborn stand at<br />
the station, some of the <strong>as</strong>sault platoons
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 85<br />
of the 27th Fuesilier Regiment circled<br />
back to the northe<strong>as</strong>t and onto the left<br />
of the 1st Battalion (Lt. Col. Robert H.<br />
Dougl<strong>as</strong>). Here one of the battalion<br />
antitank guns stopped the lead German<br />
tank and the supporting fusiliers were<br />
driven back by 81-mm. mortar fire thick-<br />
ened by an artillery barrage. The major<br />
threat in the Losheimergraben sector<br />
came shortly after noon when the 48th<br />
Grenadier Regiment finally completed<br />
its tortuous approach through the woods,<br />
mines, and wire, and struck between B<br />
and C Companies. B Company lost some<br />
sixty men and w<strong>as</strong> forced back about 400<br />
yards; then, with the help of the attached<br />
heavy machine gun platoon, it stiffened<br />
and held. During the fight Sgt. Eddie<br />
Dolenc moved his machine gun forward<br />
to a shell hole which gave a better field of<br />
fire. When l<strong>as</strong>t seen Sergeant Dolenc still<br />
w<strong>as</strong> firing, a heap of gray-coated bodies<br />
lying in front of the shell hole. 6 The C<br />
Company outposts were driven in, but<br />
two platoons held their original positions<br />
throughout the day. Company A beat off<br />
the German infantry <strong>as</strong>sault when this<br />
struck its forward platoon; then the<br />
battalion mortar platoon, raising its<br />
tubes to an 89-degree angle, rained shells<br />
on the <strong>as</strong>sault group, leaving some eighty<br />
grenadiers dead or wounded.<br />
The early morning attack against the<br />
right flank of the 394th had given alarm-<br />
ing indication that the very tenuous con-<br />
nection with the 14th Cavalry Group<br />
had been severed and that the southern<br />
flank of the 99th Division w<strong>as</strong> exposed<br />
to some depth. The only connecting link,<br />
the 30-man I and R Platoon of the 394th,<br />
northwest of Lanzerath, had lost physical<br />
contact early in the day both with the<br />
6 Sergeant Dolenc w<strong>as</strong> listed <strong>as</strong> MIA; he w<strong>as</strong><br />
awarded the DSC.<br />
cavalry and with its own regiment. Radio<br />
communication with the isolated platoon<br />
continued for some time, and at 1140<br />
word w<strong>as</strong> relayed to the 99th Division<br />
command post that the cavalry w<strong>as</strong> pull-<br />
ing out of Lanzerath–confirmation, if<br />
such were needed, of the German break-<br />
through on the right of the 99th.<br />
Belatedly, the 106th Infantry Division<br />
reported at 1315 that it could no longer<br />
maintain contact at the interdivision<br />
boundary. Less than an hour later the<br />
radio connection with the I and R Pla-<br />
toon failed. By this time observers had<br />
seen strong German forces pouring west<br />
through the Lanzerath area. (These<br />
were from the 3d Parachute Division.)<br />
General Lauer’s plans for using the 3d<br />
Battalion, 394th Infantry, <strong>as</strong> a counter-<br />
attack force were no longer fe<strong>as</strong>ible. The<br />
3d Battalion, itself under attack, could<br />
not be committed elsew<strong>here</strong> <strong>as</strong> a unit and<br />
reverted to its parent regiment. Not long<br />
after the final report from the I and R<br />
Platoon, the 3d Battalion w<strong>as</strong> faced to<br />
the southwest in positions along the<br />
railroad.<br />
A check made after dark showed a dis-<br />
couraging situation in the 394th sector.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> true that the 2d Battalion, in the<br />
north, had not been much affected by<br />
the day's events-but German troops<br />
were moving deeper on the left and right<br />
of the battalion. In the Losheimergraben<br />
area the 1st Battalion had re-formed in<br />
a thin and precarious line; the crossroads<br />
still were denied the enemy. But B<br />
Company had only twenty men available<br />
for combat, while the enemy settled<br />
down in the deserted American foxholes<br />
only a matter of yards away. Four pla-<br />
toons had been taken from the 3d Battal-<br />
ion to reinforce the 1st, leaving the<br />
former with no more than a hundred
86 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
men along the railroad line. Farther to<br />
the west, however, about 125 men of the<br />
3d Battalion who had been on leave at<br />
the rest center in Honsfeld formed a<br />
provisional unit extending somewhat the<br />
precarious 394th flank position.<br />
Some help w<strong>as</strong> on the way. General<br />
Lauer had <strong>as</strong>ked the 2d Division for a<br />
rifle battalion to man a position which<br />
the 99th had prepared before the attack<br />
<strong>as</strong> a division backstop between Mür-<br />
ringen and Hünningen. At 1600 Colonel<br />
Riley w<strong>as</strong> told that the 394th would be<br />
reinforced by the 1st Battalion, 23d In-<br />
fantry, of the 2d Division. During the<br />
night this fresh rifle battalion, and a<br />
company each of tanks and tank destroy-<br />
ers, under the command of Lt. Col.<br />
John M. Hightower, moved from Elsen-<br />
born to take up positions south and<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t of Hünningen. Before sunrise,<br />
17 December, these reinforcements were<br />
in place.<br />
During the night of 16–17 December<br />
the entire infantry reserve in the 99th<br />
Division zone had been committed in the<br />
line or close behind it, this backup con-<br />
sisting of the local reserves of the 99th<br />
and the entire 23d Infantry, which had<br />
been left at Elsenborn while its sister<br />
regiments took part in the 2d Division<br />
attack to break out in the Wahlerscheid<br />
sector. The 3d Battalion of the 23d had<br />
set up a defensive position on a ridge<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t of Rocherath, prepared to sup-<br />
port the 393d Infantry. The 2d Battalion<br />
had <strong>as</strong>sembled in the late afternoon of<br />
the 16th approximately a mile and a<br />
quarter north of Rocherath. The 1st<br />
Battalion would be at Hünningen.<br />
Troops of the 2d Division had continued<br />
the attack on 16 December, but during<br />
the afternoon Maj. Gen. Walter M.<br />
Robertson made plans for a withdrawal,<br />
if necessary, from the Wahlerscheid<br />
sector.<br />
As early <strong>as</strong> 1100 word of the German<br />
attacks on the V Corps front had pro-<br />
duced results at the command post of the<br />
northern neighbor, the VII Corps. The<br />
26th Infantry of the uncommitted 1st<br />
Infantry Division, then placed on a 6-<br />
hour alert, finally entrucked at midnight<br />
and started the move south to Camp<br />
Elsenborn. The transfer of this regi-<br />
mental combat team to the V Corps<br />
would have a most important effect on<br />
the ensuing American defense.<br />
The First Attacks in the Monschau-<br />
Höfen Sector Are Repulsed<br />
16 December<br />
The village of Höfen, the anchor point<br />
for the northern flank of the 99th Divi-<br />
sion, had considerable importance in<br />
the attack plans of the German Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. Located on high ground,<br />
Höfen overlooked the road center at<br />
Monschau, just to the north, and thus<br />
barred entry to the road to Eupen–at<br />
the moment the headquarters of the V<br />
Corps.<br />
For some re<strong>as</strong>on Field Marshal Model<br />
wished to save the German town of<br />
Monschau from destruction and had for-<br />
bidden the use of artillery t<strong>here</strong>. 7 The<br />
plan handed General Hitzfeld for the<br />
employment of his LXVII Corps (Corps<br />
Monschau) called for an attack to the<br />
north and south of Monschau that w<strong>as</strong><br />
intended to put two divisions <strong>as</strong>tride the<br />
Monschau-Eupen road in position to<br />
check any American reinforcements at-<br />
tempting a move to the south. The right<br />
division of the Corps Monschau, the<br />
7 Among his staff it w<strong>as</strong> rumored that Model<br />
wished to save the historic latticed houses <strong>here</strong>.
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 87<br />
326th Volks Grenadier Division, had<br />
been ordered to put all three regiments<br />
in the initial attack: one to swing north<br />
of Monschau and seize the village of<br />
Mützenich on the Eupen road; one to<br />
crack the American line south of Mon-<br />
schau, then drive northwest to the high<br />
ground on the road just beyond<br />
Mützenich; the third to join the 246th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division drive through<br />
Höfen and Kalterherberg, the latter<br />
<strong>as</strong>tride the main road from Monschau<br />
south to Butgenbach. If all went accord-<br />
ing to plan, the 326th and 246th would<br />
continue northwestward along the<br />
Eupen road until they reached the<br />
Vesdre River at the outskirts of Eupen. 8<br />
The force available to Hitzfeld on the<br />
morning of 16 December for use in the<br />
Monschau–Höfen sector w<strong>as</strong> consider-<br />
ably weaker than the 2-division attack<br />
planned by the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. In<br />
the two nights before the attack the<br />
326th Volks Grenadier Division had<br />
moved into the West Wall fortifications<br />
facing Monschau and Höfen. The<br />
American attack against the 277th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division at Kesternich, how-<br />
ever, siphoned off one battalion to rein-<br />
force the latter division; in addition one<br />
battalion failed to arrive in line by the<br />
morning of 16 December. Worse, the<br />
246th Volks Grenadier Division, sup-<br />
posed to come south from the Jülich sec-<br />
tor, had been held t<strong>here</strong> by American<br />
attacks. Hitzfeld w<strong>as</strong> thus left with only<br />
8 The account of the operations conducted by<br />
this corps is none too precise: MS # B–092, 326th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division, 16 December 1944–25<br />
January 1945 (Generalmajor Erwin K<strong>as</strong>chner),<br />
and MS # A–937, The Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive, De-<br />
cember 1944 (General der Infanterie Otto Hitz-<br />
feld). The AAR’s prepared by the 395th Infantry<br />
and the 38th and 102d Cavalry Reconnaissance<br />
Squadrons are quite complete.<br />
a few indifferent fortress troops on the<br />
south flank of the 326th Division. The<br />
total <strong>as</strong>sault strength in the Höfen-<br />
Monschau area, <strong>as</strong> a result, w<strong>as</strong> between<br />
three and four battalions. Nonetheless,<br />
Hitzfeld and the 326th commander,<br />
Generalmajor Erwin K<strong>as</strong>chner, could<br />
count on a heavy weight of artillery fire<br />
to give momentum to the attack. Two<br />
artillery corps (possibly totaling ten bat-<br />
talions) were in position to give fire<br />
either north or south of the no-fire zone<br />
at Monschau, plus one or two Volks<br />
Werfer brigades–a considerable group-<br />
ment for the support of a division attack<br />
at this stage of the war.<br />
The American strength in the Höfen-<br />
Monschau sector consisted of one rifle<br />
battalion and a reconnaissance squadron:<br />
the 3d Battalion, 395th Infantry, under<br />
Lt. Col. McClernand Butler, in Höfen-<br />
and the 38th Cavalry Reconnaissance<br />
Squadron (Lt. Col. Robert E. O’Brien)<br />
outposting Monschau and deployed to<br />
the north along the railroad track be-<br />
tween Mützenich and Konzen station.<br />
The infantry at Höfen lay in a foxhole<br />
line along a thousand-yard front on the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern side of the village, backed up by<br />
dug-out support positions on which the<br />
battalion had labored for some six weeks.<br />
Two nights prior to the German offen-<br />
sive, Company A of the 612th Tank De-<br />
stroyer Battalion towed its 3-inch guns<br />
into the Höfen sector for the purpose of<br />
getting good firing positions against the<br />
village of Rohren, northe<strong>as</strong>t of Höfen,<br />
which lay in the path of the 2d Infantry<br />
Division attack. The appearance of the<br />
guns, sited well forward and swathed in<br />
sheets for protective coloration in the<br />
falling snow, gave a lift to the infantry,<br />
who <strong>as</strong> yet had to fight their first battle.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the west the 105-mm. howitzers of
88<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
CONSTRING A WINTERIZED SQUAD HUT NEAR THE FRONT LINES<br />
the 196th Field Artillery Battalion were<br />
emplaced to give the battalion direct<br />
support.<br />
The 38th Cavalry Squadron w<strong>as</strong><br />
aligned from Monschau north to Konzen<br />
station, holding a continuous position<br />
with fifty dismounted machine guns dug<br />
in behind mines, barbed wire, and trip<br />
flares covering the approaches from the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. The right flank of the squadron,<br />
outposting Monschau, w<strong>as</strong> at some dis-<br />
advantage because of the deep, rocky<br />
draws leading into and p<strong>as</strong>t the town.<br />
But to the north the terrain w<strong>as</strong> less cut<br />
up and offered good fields of fire for the<br />
American weapons posted on the slopes<br />
west of the railroad track. In addition to<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sault gun troop in Mützenick, the<br />
squadron w<strong>as</strong> reinforced by a platoon of<br />
self-propelled tank destroyers from the<br />
893d Tank Destroyer Battalion, which<br />
w<strong>as</strong> stationed behind the left flank to<br />
cover a secondary road which entered<br />
the American position, and the 62d Ar-<br />
mored Field Artillery Battalion. On the<br />
whole the defense in the Monschau-<br />
Höfen area w<strong>as</strong> well set when the battal-<br />
ions of the 326th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion moved forward to their attack<br />
positions on the morning of 16 Decem-<br />
ber.<br />
The German guns and Werfers
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 89<br />
opened a very heavy barrage at 0525,<br />
rolling over the forward lines, then back<br />
to the west along the Eupen road, shell-<br />
ing the American artillery positions and<br />
cutting telephone wires. Neither the in-<br />
fantry nor cavalry (gone well to ground)<br />
suffered much from this fire, heavy<br />
though it w<strong>as</strong>; but many buildings were<br />
set afire in Höfen and some were beaten<br />
to the ground. Monschau, <strong>as</strong> directed by<br />
Model, escaped this artillery pounding.<br />
In twenty minutes or so the German fire<br />
died away and off to the e<strong>as</strong>t the glow of<br />
searchlights rose <strong>as</strong> artificial moonlight.<br />
About 0600 the German grenadiers came<br />
walking out of the haze in front of the 3d<br />
Battalion. The wire to the American<br />
guns w<strong>as</strong> out and during the initial on-<br />
slaught even radio failed to reach the<br />
gunners. The riflemen and tank destroy-<br />
er gunners, however, had the German<br />
infantry in their sights, without cover<br />
and at a murderously e<strong>as</strong>y range.<br />
The result w<strong>as</strong> fant<strong>as</strong>tic. Yet the<br />
grenadiers who lived long enough came<br />
right up to the firing line–in three<br />
verified instances the bodies of Germans<br />
shot at close range toppled into the fox-<br />
holes from which the bullets came. A<br />
few got through and into the village.<br />
Assault companies of the 1st Battalion,<br />
751st Regiment, and the 1st Battalion,<br />
753d Regiment, had made this attack.<br />
But the support companies of the two<br />
battalions were blocked out by an in-<br />
tense concentration of well-aimed 81 -<br />
mm. mortar fire from the American<br />
heavy weapons company, this curtain<br />
strengthened within an hour by the sup-<br />
porting howitzer battalion. By 0745 the<br />
attack w<strong>as</strong> finished, and in another hour<br />
some thirty or forty Germans who had<br />
reached the nearest houses were rounded<br />
up. Reports of the German dead<br />
“counted” in front of Höfen vary from<br />
seventy-five to two hundred. The c<strong>as</strong>ual-<br />
ties suffered by the 3d Battalion in this<br />
first action were extraordinarily light:<br />
four killed, seven wounded, and four<br />
missing.<br />
At Monschau the 1st Battalion of the<br />
752d Regiment carried the attack, ap-<br />
parently aimed at cutting between the<br />
Monschau and Höfen defenses. As the<br />
German shellfire lessened, about 0600,<br />
the cavalry outposts heard troops moving<br />
along the Rohren road which entered<br />
Monschau from the southe<strong>as</strong>t. The<br />
grenadiers were allowed to approach the<br />
barbed wire at the roadblock, then illu-<br />
minating mortar shell w<strong>as</strong> fired over the<br />
Germans and the cavalry opened up with<br />
every weapon at hand–the light tanks<br />
doing heavy damage with 37-mm. canis-<br />
ter. Beaten back in this first <strong>as</strong>sault, the<br />
German battalion tried again at day-<br />
light, this time attempting to filter into<br />
town along a draw a little farther to the<br />
north. This move w<strong>as</strong> checked quickly.<br />
No further attack w<strong>as</strong> essayed at Mon-<br />
schau and a half-hearted attempt at<br />
Höfen, toward noon, w<strong>as</strong> handily re-<br />
pelled. As it w<strong>as</strong>, the 326th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division lost one-fifth of the<br />
troops put into these attacks.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the south of Höfen and Monschau<br />
in the 2d Division and 395th Infantry<br />
zones, 16 December p<strong>as</strong>sed with the<br />
initiative still in American hands. The<br />
German attacks delivered north and<br />
south of the corridor through which the<br />
Americans were pushing had no immedi-<br />
ate repercussion, not even in the 395th<br />
Infantry sector. The Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
drive to make a penetration between<br />
Hollerath and Krewinkel with the 1st<br />
SS Panzer Corps, t<strong>here</strong>fore, had no con-<br />
tact with the Monschau Corps in the
90 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
north, nor w<strong>as</strong> such contact intended in<br />
the early stages of the move west. The<br />
German command would pay scant at-<br />
tention to the small American salient<br />
projecting between the LXVII Corps<br />
and the 1st SS Panzer Corps, counting on<br />
the hard-pressed 272d Volks Grenadier<br />
Division to hold in the Wahlerscheid-<br />
Simmerath sector so long <strong>as</strong> needed.<br />
The German Effort Continues<br />
17–18 December<br />
Although hard hit and in serious<br />
trouble at the end of the first day, par-<br />
ticularly on the right flank <strong>as</strong> General<br />
Lauer saw it, the inexperienced 99th<br />
Division had acquitted itself in a manner<br />
calculated to win the reluctant admira-<br />
tion of the enemy. German losses had<br />
been high. W<strong>here</strong> the American lines<br />
had been penetrated, in the 393d and<br />
394th sectors, the defenders simply had<br />
been overwhelmed by superior numbers<br />
of the enemy who had been able to work<br />
close in through the dense woods. Most<br />
important of all, the stanch defense of<br />
Losheimergraben had denied the wait-<br />
ing tank columns of the I SS Panzer<br />
Corps direct and e<strong>as</strong>y entrance to the<br />
main Bullingen-Malmédy road.<br />
The initial German failure to wedge<br />
an opening for armor through the 99th,<br />
for failure it must be reckoned, w<strong>as</strong> very<br />
nearly balanced by the clear break-<br />
through achieved in the 14th Cavalry<br />
Group sector. The 3d Parachute Divi-<br />
sion, carrying the left wing of the I SS<br />
Panzer Corps forward, had followed the<br />
retreating cavalry through Manderfeld,<br />
swung north, and by dusk had troops in<br />
Lanzerath—only two kilometers from<br />
the 3d Battalion, 394th, position at Buch-<br />
holz.<br />
The 12th SS Panzer Division could not<br />
yet reach the Bullingen road. The 1st<br />
SS Panzer Division stood ready and wait-<br />
ing to exploit the opening made by the<br />
3d Parachute Division by an advance via<br />
Lanzerath onto the Honsfeld road. Dur-<br />
ing the early evening the advance kampf-<br />
gruppe of the 1st SS Panzer Division, a<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force built around the 1st SS Panz-<br />
er Regiment (Obersturmbannfuehrer<br />
Joachim Peiper) , rolled northwest to<br />
Lanzerath. At midnight–an exception-<br />
ally dark night–German tanks and in-<br />
fantry struck suddenly at Buchholz. The<br />
two platoons of Company K, left t<strong>here</strong><br />
when the 3d Battalion stripped its lines<br />
to reinforce the Losheimergraben de-<br />
fenders, were engulfed. One man, the<br />
company radio operator, escaped. Hid-<br />
den in the cellar of the old battalion<br />
command post near the railroad station,<br />
he reported the German search on the<br />
Boor above, then the presence of tanks<br />
outside the building with sw<strong>as</strong>tik<strong>as</strong><br />
painted on their sides. His almost hourly<br />
reports, relayed through the 1st Battal-<br />
ion, kept the division headquarters in-<br />
formed of the German movements.<br />
About 0500 on 17 December the main<br />
German column began its march<br />
through Buchholz. Still at his post, the<br />
radio operator counted thirty tanks,<br />
twenty-eight half-tracks filled with Ger-<br />
man infantry, and long columns of foot<br />
troops marching by the roadside. All of<br />
the armored t<strong>as</strong>k force of the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division and a considerable part<br />
of the 3d Parachute Division were mov-<br />
ing toward Honsfeld.<br />
Honsfeld, well in the rear area of the<br />
99th, w<strong>as</strong> occupied by a variety of troops.<br />
The provisional unit raised at the divi-<br />
sion rest camp seems to have been de-<br />
ployed around the town. Two platoons
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 91<br />
of the 801st Tank Destroyer Battalion<br />
had been sent in by General Lauer to<br />
hold the road, and during the night a<br />
few towed guns from the 612th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion were added to the<br />
defenses. Honsfeld w<strong>as</strong> in the V Corps<br />
antiaircraft defense belt and two battal-<br />
ions of 90-mm. antiaircraft guns had<br />
been sited t<strong>here</strong>about. In addition,<br />
Troop A, 32d Cavalry Reconnaissance<br />
Squadron, had arrived in Honsfeld late in<br />
the evening.<br />
The stream of American traffic mov-<br />
ing into the village during the night<br />
probably explains the e<strong>as</strong>e with which<br />
the Honsfeld garrison w<strong>as</strong> routed. The<br />
leading German tanks simply joined<br />
this traffic, and, calmly led by a man<br />
signaling with a fl<strong>as</strong>hlight, rolled down<br />
the village streets. With German troops<br />
pouring in from all sides the Americans<br />
offered no concrete resistance. Though<br />
some made a fight of it, most engaged in<br />
a wild scramble to get out of town. Some<br />
of the tank destroyers were overrun by<br />
infantry attack through the dark. Guns<br />
and vehicles, jammed on the exit roads,<br />
were abandoned; but many of the<br />
Americans, minus their equipment,<br />
escaped.<br />
The predawn seizure of Honsfeld<br />
opened D route to the spearhead column<br />
of the 1st SS Panzer Division. Reconnais-<br />
sance, however, showed that the next<br />
section of this route, between Honsfeld<br />
and Schoppen, w<strong>as</strong> in very poor condi-<br />
tion. Since the 12th SS Panzer Division<br />
had not yet reached C route, the<br />
main Büllingen-Malmédy road, Peiper’s<br />
kampfgruppe now turned north in the<br />
direction of Büllingen with the intention<br />
of continuing the westward drive on<br />
pavement.<br />
At 0100 on 17 December the 254th<br />
Engineer Battalion had been attached to<br />
the 99th Division and ordered to Bül-<br />
lingen, t<strong>here</strong> to prepare positions cover-<br />
ing the entrances from the south and<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t. Twice during the dark hours<br />
the engineers beat back German infan-<br />
try attacks; then, a little after 0700,<br />
enemy tanks hove into sight. Falling back<br />
to the shelter of the buildings, the 254th<br />
did what it could to fend off the tanks.<br />
Here, in the town, a reconnaissance pla-<br />
toon of the 644th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion had just arrived with orders<br />
to establish contact with the enemy<br />
column, but only one section managed<br />
to evade the panzers. The rest of the<br />
platoon were killed or captured. Upon<br />
receipt of orders from the division, the<br />
engineers, who had clung stubbornly to<br />
houses in the west edge, withdrew and<br />
dug in on higher ground 1,000 yards to<br />
the northwest so <strong>as</strong> to block the road to<br />
Butgenbach. T<strong>here</strong> the two companies<br />
of the 254th still intact were joined by<br />
men h<strong>as</strong>tily <strong>as</strong>sembled from the 99th Di-<br />
vision headquarters, the antiaircraft<br />
artillery units in the vicinity, and four<br />
guns from the 612th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the surprise of the Americans<br />
gat<strong>here</strong>d along this l<strong>as</strong>t thin line the<br />
Germans did not pursue the attack. By<br />
1030 a long line of tanks and vehicles<br />
were seen streaming through Büllingen,<br />
but they were moving toward the south-<br />
west! Later, the 99th Division com-<br />
mander would comment that “the enemy<br />
had the key to success within his hands,<br />
but did not know it.” And so it must<br />
have seemed to the Americans on 17 De-<br />
cember when a sharp northward thrust<br />
from Büllingen would have met little<br />
opposition and probably would have<br />
entrapped both the 99th and 2d Divi-
92 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
sions. In fact, Peiper’s column had simply<br />
made a detour north through Büllingen<br />
and, having avoided a bad stretch of<br />
road, now circled back to its prescribed<br />
route.<br />
American ground observers, on the<br />
17th, attributed the change in direction<br />
to intervention by friendly fighter-<br />
bombers, whose attack, so it appeared,<br />
“diverted” the German column to the<br />
southwest. Two squadrons of the 366th<br />
Fighter Group, called into the area to aid<br />
the 99th Division, made two attacks dur-<br />
ing the morning. The 389th Squadron<br />
struck one section of the German col-<br />
umn, which promptly scattered into<br />
nearby woods, and claimed a kill of<br />
thirty tanks and motor vehicles. It is<br />
doubtful that the Germans were crip-<br />
pled to any such extent-certainly the<br />
move west w<strong>as</strong> little delayed-but the<br />
American troops must have been greatly<br />
heartened. The 390th Squadron, direct-<br />
ed onto the column now estimated to be<br />
two hundred vehicles or more, w<strong>as</strong> in-<br />
tercepted by a squadron of ME-log’s<br />
which dropped out of the clouds over<br />
Büllingen. The Americans accounted<br />
for seven German aircraft, but had to<br />
jettison most of their bombs.<br />
Losheimergraben Is Lost<br />
The lack of highway bridges over the<br />
railroad south of Losheimergraben had<br />
turned the first day’s battle for the<br />
Losheimergraben crossroads into an in-<br />
fantry fight in the surrounding woods.<br />
Both sides had sustained heavy losses.<br />
The 48th Grenadier Regiment had<br />
pushed the 1st Battalion of the 394th<br />
back, but had failed to break through<br />
to the tiny collection of customs build-<br />
ings and houses at the crossroads. By<br />
daylight on 17 December the Americans<br />
held a fairly continuous but thinly<br />
manned front with the 1st Battalion<br />
around Losheimergraben, part of the 3d<br />
Battalion west of the village, and the 1st<br />
Battalion of the 23d Infantry holding the<br />
exposed right-flank position in Hünnin-<br />
gen.<br />
The 12th Volks Grenadier Division,<br />
under pressure from higher head-<br />
quarters to take Losheimergraben, con-<br />
tinued the attack with both its forward<br />
regiments, now considerably weakened.<br />
While the 27th Fuesilier Regiment<br />
moved to flank Losheimergraben on the<br />
west, the 48th Grenadier Regiment<br />
continued its costly frontal attack. The<br />
flanking attack w<strong>as</strong> successful: at le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
a battalion of the 27th drove through<br />
a gap between the 1st and 3d Bat-<br />
talions. By 1100 the German infantry<br />
were able to bring the Losheim-Büllin-<br />
gen road under small arms fire and the<br />
noose w<strong>as</strong> tightening on the Losheimer-<br />
graben defenders. The frontal attack,<br />
at the latter point, w<strong>as</strong> resumed before<br />
dawn by enemy patrols trying to find a<br />
way around the American firing line<br />
in the woods.<br />
In a foxhole line 200 yards southe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Losheimergraben, 1st Lt. Dewey<br />
Plankers had organized about fifty men.<br />
This small force-men from Companies<br />
B and C, jeep drivers, and the crew of a<br />
defunct antiaircraft gun-beat back all<br />
of the German patrols. But the game w<strong>as</strong><br />
nearly up. The enemy Pioneers finally<br />
threw a bridge over the railroad at the<br />
demolished overp<strong>as</strong>s on the Losheim<br />
road, and about 1100 three panzers, sup-<br />
ported by a rifle company, appeared in<br />
the woods in front of Plankers’ position.<br />
Lacking ammunition and weapons<br />
(twenty of the tiny force were armed
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 93<br />
only with pistols), Plankers ordered his<br />
men back to the customs buildings at the<br />
crossroads and radioed for help. Car-<br />
bines, rifles, and ammunition, loaded on<br />
the only available jeep (the chaplain’s),<br />
were delivered under fire to the Ameri-<br />
can “blockhouses.” The German tankers,<br />
unwilling to chance bazooka fire at close<br />
range, held aloof from the hamlet and<br />
waited for the German gunners and<br />
some ME-log’s to finish the job. The<br />
garrison held on in the b<strong>as</strong>ements until<br />
the tanks finally moved in at dusk. Lieu-<br />
tenant Plankers had been informed in<br />
the course of the afternoon that neigh-<br />
boring troops were under orders to with-<br />
draw. He took the men he had left, now<br />
only about twenty, and broke through<br />
the Germans, rejoining what w<strong>as</strong> left<br />
of the 394th Infantry at Mürringen late<br />
in the evening.<br />
Even before the German penetration<br />
at the Losheimergraben angle, the 394th<br />
stood in danger of being cut off and<br />
destroyed piecemeal by the enemy infil-<br />
trating from the e<strong>as</strong>t and south. As part<br />
of a withdrawal plan put in effect during<br />
the afternoon for the entire division,<br />
General Lauer ordered the 394th to<br />
withdraw to a second defensive position<br />
at Mürringen, about four kilometers in<br />
the rear of the regiment’s e<strong>as</strong>tern front.<br />
The 2d Battalion, holding the north<br />
flank, w<strong>as</strong> under pressure from both<br />
right and left. At dawn of 17 December,<br />
the enemy had attacked along the<br />
Neuhof road with tanks in the van.<br />
Company E, directly in the path, used its<br />
bazook<strong>as</strong> with such good effect that three<br />
panzers were crippled. Excellent artil-<br />
lery support and fine shooting by the<br />
battalion mortars helped discourage any<br />
further frontal <strong>as</strong>sault. Infiltration on<br />
the flanks, however, had placed the 2d<br />
Battalion in serious plight when, at 1400,<br />
the order came to withdraw west and tie<br />
in with the 3d Battalion. Leaving a small<br />
covering force behind, the 2d Battalion<br />
started on foot through the woods,<br />
carrying its heavy weapons over the<br />
rugged and snow-covered trails. The<br />
Germans also were moving through the<br />
forest, and the battalion w<strong>as</strong> unable to<br />
turn toward the 3d <strong>as</strong> ordered. With-<br />
drawing deeper into the forest the bat-<br />
talion bivouacked in the sector known<br />
<strong>as</strong> the Honsfelder Wald. The covering<br />
force, however, made its way to Mür-<br />
ringen, w<strong>here</strong> it w<strong>as</strong> set to defend the<br />
regimental command post.<br />
The 1st Battalion, in the Losheimer-<br />
graben sector, had been so splintered by<br />
incessant German attack that its with-<br />
drawal w<strong>as</strong> a piecemeal affair. Isolated<br />
groups fought or dodged their way west.<br />
Two hundred and sixty officers and men<br />
made it. 9 Two platoons from Company K<br />
which had been attached to the 1st Bat-<br />
talion did not receive word of the with-<br />
drawal and held on under heavy shelling<br />
until ammunition w<strong>as</strong> nearly spent. It<br />
took these men twenty-four hours to<br />
wade back through the snow to the regi-<br />
mental lines. What w<strong>as</strong> left of the 3d<br />
Battalion also fell back toward Mürrin-<br />
gen, har<strong>as</strong>sed by groups of the enemy en<br />
route and uncertain <strong>as</strong> to what would be<br />
found at Murringen.<br />
The survivors of the 394th Infantry<br />
now <strong>as</strong>sembling at Mürringen were<br />
given a brief breathing spell while the<br />
enemy concentrated on the 1st Battalion,<br />
23d Infantry, defending the Hünningen<br />
positions 1,500 meters to the south. The<br />
12th Volks Grenadier Division attack<br />
finally had broken through the American<br />
9 The 1st Battalion of the 394th w<strong>as</strong> accorded<br />
a Presidential Citation for its role in this battle.
94 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
line but now w<strong>as</strong> definitely behind sched-<br />
ule. The 48th Regiment, having been<br />
much reduced in strength in the fight<br />
around Losheimergraben, re-formed on<br />
the high ground between the forest edge<br />
and Murringen. The north flank of the<br />
regiment lay exposed to counterattack,<br />
for the 277th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
on the right had been checked in its at-<br />
tempt to take the twin villages, Krinkelt-<br />
Rocherath. The fight now devolved on<br />
the 27th Regiment, which w<strong>as</strong> ordered<br />
to take Hunningen before an attempt to<br />
roll up the American south flank.<br />
Colonel Hightower’s 1st Battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
in a difficult and exposed position at<br />
Hunningen. His main strength, de-<br />
ployed to counter German pressure from<br />
the Buchholz-Honsfeld area, faced south<br />
and southe<strong>as</strong>t, but the German columns<br />
taking the Honsfeld-Büllingen detour<br />
were moving toward the northwest and<br />
thus behind the Hunningen defenders.<br />
Whether any part of this latter enemy<br />
force would turn against the rear of the<br />
1st Battalion w<strong>as</strong> the question.<br />
Through the morning the 1st Battal-<br />
ion watched through breaks in the fog <strong>as</strong><br />
tanks and vehicles rolled toward Büllin-<br />
gen. Visibility, poor <strong>as</strong> it w<strong>as</strong>, made ar-<br />
tillery adjustment on the road difficult<br />
and ineffective. Shortly after noon about<br />
120 men who had been cut off from the<br />
2d and 254th Engineer Battalions<br />
arrived at Hightower’s command post<br />
and were dispatched to form a roadblock<br />
against a possible attack from Büllingen.<br />
Somewhat earlier twelve Mark IV<br />
tanks had appeared south of Hunningen<br />
-perhaps by design, perhaps by acci-<br />
dent. Assembled at the woods edge some<br />
800 yards from the American foxhole<br />
line, the panzers may have been seeking<br />
haven from the American fighter-<br />
bombers then working over the road. In<br />
any c<strong>as</strong>e they were shooting-gallery<br />
targets. One of the towed 3-inch guns<br />
which the 801st Tank Destroyer Battal-<br />
ion had withdrawn during the early<br />
morning debacle at Honsfeld knocked<br />
out four of the panzers in six shots. The<br />
rest withdrew in h<strong>as</strong>te.<br />
At 1600 the enemy made his first defi-<br />
nite <strong>as</strong>sault, preceded by six minutes of<br />
furious shelling. When the artillery<br />
ce<strong>as</strong>ed, German infantry were seen<br />
coming forward through a neck of woods<br />
pointing toward the southe<strong>as</strong>tern edge<br />
of Hunningen. A forward observer with<br />
Company B, facing the woods, climbed<br />
into the church steeple and brought<br />
down shellfire which kept pace with the<br />
attackers until they were within a hun-<br />
dred yards of the American foxholes. A<br />
number of the enemy did break through,<br />
but the <strong>as</strong>sault evaporated when nearly<br />
fifty were killed by four men manning<br />
automatic weapons from a platoon com-<br />
mand post just in the rear of the firing<br />
line. The commander of the 27th<br />
Regiment sent forward seven “distinct<br />
attacking waves” in the course of the<br />
afternoon and early evening. In one <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault the Germans captured two heavy<br />
machine guns and turned them on Com-<br />
pany A, but a light machine gun section<br />
wiped out the German crews. At no<br />
time, despite numerous penetrations in<br />
the 1st Battalion line, w<strong>as</strong> the enemy<br />
able to get Hunningen into his hands. 10<br />
Late in the afternoon an indistinct<br />
radio message w<strong>as</strong> picked up by the 1st<br />
Battalion, 23d Infantry. It appeared that<br />
the battalion now w<strong>as</strong> attached to the<br />
9th Infantry (2d Division) , to the north,<br />
and that orders were to pull out of Hün-<br />
10 Colonel Hightower w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC for<br />
his conduct of the defense.
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 95<br />
ningen. Up to this point, the 394th<br />
Infantry w<strong>as</strong> still in Mürringen, gather-<br />
ing its companies and platoons <strong>as</strong> they<br />
straggled in. Furthermore the 1st Bat-<br />
talion w<strong>as</strong> in a fire fight with an enemy<br />
only a few score yards distant in the<br />
darkness. Colonel Hightower, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
tried by radio to apprise the 9th Infantry<br />
of his predicament and the importance of<br />
holding until the 394th could reorganize.<br />
At 2330 Colonel Hirschfelder, the 9th<br />
Infantry commander, reached High-<br />
tower by radio, told him that<br />
Hightower’s battalion and the 394th<br />
Infantry were almost surrounded and<br />
that, if the battalion expected to with-<br />
draw, it must move at once. Colonel<br />
Hightower again explained his situation,<br />
said that in his opinion he could not pull<br />
out unless and until the 394th withdrew,<br />
but that he would discuss the situation<br />
with the commander of the 394th.<br />
Hirschfelder agreed and told Hightower<br />
to use his own judgment.<br />
At Mürringen Colonel Riley’s 394th<br />
had not been hard pressed although the<br />
German artillery had shown no favori-<br />
tism and hammered Mürringen and<br />
Hünningen equally. The groups filter-<br />
ing back to Mürringen, however, gener-<br />
ally had very little ammunition left,<br />
even though many detachments came<br />
back with all their heavy weapons. If the<br />
394th w<strong>as</strong> to make a stand at Mürringen<br />
it would have to be resupplied. At first<br />
Colonel Riley hoped to get ammunition<br />
by air, for it appeared that the German<br />
drive in the Krinkelt area to the north<br />
shortly would cut the l<strong>as</strong>t remaining<br />
supply road. This w<strong>as</strong> a vain hope for<br />
aerial supply missions in December were<br />
far too chancy. The alternative solution<br />
w<strong>as</strong> for the 394th to withdraw north to<br />
Krinkelt, using the one route still open.<br />
The German Attack <strong>To</strong>ward Rocherath<br />
and Krinkelt, 16–17 December<br />
The 393d Infantry (Lt. Col. Jean D.<br />
Scott) had taken no part in the V Corps<br />
offensive of 13 December except to put<br />
on a “demonstration” in front of the<br />
West Wall positions. The regiment,<br />
minus its 2d Battalion (attached to the<br />
395th Infantry), w<strong>as</strong> deployed along the<br />
German frontier, a line generally<br />
defined by the e<strong>as</strong>tern edge of the long<br />
forest belt in which the bulk of the 99th<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> stationed and the Inter-<br />
national Highway. The width of the<br />
front, held by the 3d Battalion on the<br />
left and the 1st Battalion on the right,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> about 5,500 yards. Outposts on the<br />
regimental left lay only a few score yards<br />
from the West Wall bunkers, but the<br />
right w<strong>as</strong> more than half a mile from<br />
the German lines. About four miles by<br />
trail behind the 393d, the twin villages<br />
of Rocherath and Krinkelt lay <strong>as</strong>tride<br />
the main north-south road through the<br />
division area. In front of the 393d, across<br />
the frontier, were entrances to the two<br />
forest roads which ran through the<br />
regimental sector, one in the north at<br />
Hollerath, the second in the south at<br />
Udenbreth. Both villages were in enemy<br />
hands. At the western edge of the<br />
woods the roads converged, funneling<br />
along a single track into Rocherath-<br />
Krinkelt. The twin villages, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
had a tactical importance of the first or-<br />
der. Through them p<strong>as</strong>sed the main line<br />
of communications in the 2d Division<br />
corridor, and from them ran the supply<br />
route to the 393d Infantry and the 395th.<br />
In the West Wall bunkers facing the<br />
393d lay the 277th Volks Grenadier Di-<br />
vision (Col. Hans Viebig). Recon-<br />
structed in Hungary from the remnants
96 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
of an infantry division of the same num-<br />
ber which had escaped from the Falaise<br />
pocket, the 277th arrived in the west<br />
during early November. In the days be-<br />
fore the counteroffensive the division<br />
screened the entire front behind which<br />
the I SS Panzer Corps w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembling,<br />
but on the evening of 15 December,<br />
while two new infantry divisions moved<br />
into the line, the 277th <strong>as</strong>sembled on the<br />
north flank of the corps zone between<br />
Hollerath and Udenbreth. One rein-<br />
forced battalion, on the far southern<br />
flank of the original sector, w<strong>as</strong> unable<br />
to reach the division line of departure<br />
in time to join the attack.<br />
The I SS Panzer Corps commander<br />
had decided to put the weight of his<br />
armored thrust to the south and thus<br />
avoid entanglement with the American<br />
force which, it w<strong>as</strong> thought, could be<br />
gat<strong>here</strong>d quickly on the Elsenborn ridge<br />
in the northern sector of the zone of ad-<br />
vance. But the Elsenborn area had to be<br />
neutralized, if for no other re<strong>as</strong>on than<br />
to er<strong>as</strong>e the American artillery group-<br />
ment located t<strong>here</strong>. The 277th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division had the t<strong>as</strong>k of<br />
making the penetration on the right<br />
wing of the corps and driving obliquely<br />
northwest to take the Elsenborn ridge.<br />
As finally prescribed by the corps com-<br />
mander, the ph<strong>as</strong>es of the attack planned<br />
for the 277th were these: to break<br />
through the American line and open the<br />
forest roads to Rocherath and Krinkelt;<br />
capture these twin villages; seize the<br />
Elsenborn area and block any American<br />
advance from Verviers. The division<br />
commander had received this mission<br />
with qualms, pointing out that the<br />
wooded and broken terrain favored the<br />
Americans and that without sufficient<br />
rifle strength for a quick breakthrough,<br />
success in the attack could only be won<br />
by very strong artillery support. But his<br />
orders stood. On the night of 15–16<br />
December the 989th Regiment <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembled near Hollerath, its objective<br />
Rocherath. <strong>To</strong> the south the 990th<br />
occupied the West Wall pillboxes near<br />
Udenbreth, poised for an attack to seize<br />
Krinkelt.<br />
The artillery, Werfer, and mortar fire<br />
cr<strong>as</strong>hing into the American positions on<br />
the morning of 16 December gave<br />
the attacking German infantry the start<br />
the 277th commander had requested.<br />
The concentration thoroughly wrecked<br />
the American telephone lines which had<br />
been carefully strung from battalion to<br />
company command posts; in some c<strong>as</strong>es<br />
radio communication failed at the same<br />
time. This preparatory bombardment<br />
continued until 0700.<br />
The north wing of the 393d, held by<br />
the 3d Battalion (Lt. Col. Jack G. Allen),<br />
lay in the woods close to the German<br />
pillboxes from which the <strong>as</strong>sault wave<br />
of the 989th, guided by searchlights<br />
beamed on the American positions,<br />
moved in on the Americans before they<br />
had recovered from the shelling. In the<br />
first rush all of Company K, save one<br />
platoon, were killed or captured. By<br />
0855, when telephone lines were re-<br />
stored and the first word of the 3d Bat-<br />
talion’s plight reached the regimental<br />
command post, the enemy had advanced<br />
nearly three-quarters of a mile beyond<br />
the American lines along the forest road<br />
from Hollerath. Colonel Allen stripped<br />
the reserve platoons from the balance of<br />
the 3d Battalion line in a futile attempt<br />
to block the onrush, but by 0930 the<br />
Germans had reached the battalion<br />
command post, around which Allen<br />
ordered Companies I and L to gather.
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 97<br />
At this point the 81-mm. mortar crews<br />
laid down such a successful defensive<br />
barrage (firing over 1,200 rounds in the<br />
course of the fight) that the attackers<br />
swerved from this area of danger and<br />
continued to the west. By nightfall the<br />
forward companies of the 989th were at<br />
the Jansbach creek, halfway through the<br />
forest, but had been slowed down by<br />
troops switched from the left wing of the<br />
3d Battalion and had lost many prisoners<br />
to the Americans. The 3d Battalion<br />
radio had functioned badly during the<br />
fight and contact with the 370th Field<br />
Artillery Battalion, supporting the 3d,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not established till the close of day.<br />
Despite the penetration between the 3d<br />
and 1st Battalions and the large number<br />
of enemy now to the rear and across the<br />
battalion supply road, Colonel Allen re-<br />
ported that the 3d could hold on during<br />
the night. His supply road had been cut<br />
in midafternoon, but Company I of the<br />
394th had fought its way in with a supply<br />
of ammunition.<br />
On the south the 1st Battalion (Maj.<br />
Matthew L. Legler) likewise had been<br />
outnumbered and hard hit. Here the<br />
990th Regiment had <strong>as</strong>sembled in Uden-<br />
breth during the dark hours and, when<br />
the barrage fire lifted at 0700, began<br />
an advance toward the 1st Battalion. The<br />
German <strong>as</strong>sault companies, however,<br />
failed to get across the half mile of open<br />
ground before dawn and were checked<br />
short of the woods by mortar and ma-<br />
chine gun fire, The commander of the<br />
277th Volks Grenadier Division at once<br />
decided to throw in his reserve, the 991st<br />
Regiment, to spring the 990th loose.<br />
Sheer weight of numbers now carried<br />
the German attack across the open space<br />
and into the woods–but with high c<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ualties amongst the riflemen and the<br />
officers and noncoms herding the <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
waves forward. By 0830 the Germans<br />
had nearly surrounded Company C, on<br />
the 1st Battalion right. An hour later,<br />
the 991st Regiment, attacking southwest<br />
from Ramscheid, knocked out the light<br />
machine guns and mortars in the Com-<br />
pany B sector (on the left) with bazooka<br />
fire and captured or killed all but one<br />
platoon. Company A (Capt. Joseph<br />
Jameson) , which had been in reserve,<br />
counterattacked in support of what w<strong>as</strong><br />
left of Company B and by noon had dug<br />
in on a line only 300 yards behind the<br />
original line. Here Company A held<br />
for the rest of the day against repeated<br />
enemy attacks and constant artillery<br />
fire with what the regimental after<br />
action report characterized <strong>as</strong> “heroic<br />
action on the part of all men.” In this<br />
fight friendly artillery played an impor-<br />
tant role. The surviving Company B<br />
platoon had retained an observation<br />
post overlooking the treeless draw along<br />
which reinforcements moved from Uden-<br />
breth and despite the German fire a<br />
telephone wire w<strong>as</strong> run forward to this<br />
command post. The American gunners<br />
quickly made this avenue suicidal;<br />
through the afternoon cries from the<br />
wounded Germans lying in the draw<br />
floated back to the American line.<br />
Company C on the 1st Battalion right<br />
had slowly succumbed to the weight of<br />
numbers; by 1015 two of its platoons<br />
had been engulfed. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little that<br />
the regiment could do in response to<br />
Major Legler’s plea for <strong>as</strong>sistance, but<br />
at 1030 the mine-laying platoon from<br />
the regimental antitank company ar-<br />
rived to give a hand. This small detach-<br />
ment (26 riflemen plus 13 runners and<br />
cooks), led by Lt. Harry Parker, made<br />
a bayonet charge to reach the remaining
98 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Company C platoon and set up a new<br />
line of defense on the battalion right<br />
flank. A gap still remained between the<br />
battalion and the 394th Infantry farther<br />
south.<br />
By the end of the day the 393d Infan-<br />
try had restored a front facing the<br />
enemy. 11 But the new line could hardly<br />
be called solid, the rifle strength remain-<br />
ing w<strong>as</strong> too slim for that. The 1st Battal-<br />
ion had lost over half of its effective<br />
strength; the 3d Battalion had its right<br />
bent back for several hundred yards and<br />
had lost nearly three hundred men. The<br />
enemy wandered almost at will through<br />
the woods, firing into foxholes, shooting<br />
off flares, and calling out in English to<br />
trap the unwary. But even with the<br />
German strength apparent on all sides,<br />
the American situation seemed to be<br />
improving. Reinforcements, requested<br />
by General Lauer, had arrived from the<br />
2d Division during the late afternoon,<br />
the supply roads might be restored to<br />
traffic when daylight came again, and<br />
the losses inflicted on the attacker were<br />
obvious and heartening.<br />
The breakthrough on the south flank<br />
of the 99th Division, during 17 Decem-<br />
ber, w<strong>as</strong> paralleled that day by a strong<br />
German armored thrust into the division<br />
center. The 393d, whose left battalion<br />
had been driven back into the deep<br />
woods during the first day’s attack, w<strong>as</strong><br />
under orders to counterattack and re-<br />
store its original line. The 3d Battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> close to being surrounded, and in<br />
11 Pfc. R. D. Smith and Pfc. Angelo Cestoni<br />
were awarded the DSC for bravery in the fight by<br />
the 393d Infantry. It should be added that the<br />
forward observers of the 370th Field Artillery<br />
Battalion, which w<strong>as</strong> supporting the infantrymen<br />
of the 393d, also distinguished themselves and<br />
order to recover its e<strong>as</strong>tern position at<br />
the wood line it would have to reopen<br />
the battalion supply road. At 0800<br />
Colonel Allen’s tired and weakened<br />
battalion attacked to the west and drove<br />
the enemy off the road, but when the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tward counterattack started it<br />
collided with a battalion of German<br />
infantry. For half an hour Germans and<br />
Americans fought for a hundred-yard-<br />
wide strip of the woods. Then, about<br />
1000, the German armor took a hand.<br />
The failure by the 277th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division to clear the woods and<br />
reach Krinkelt-Rocherath on 16 Decem-<br />
ber had led to some change of plan.<br />
The right flank, roughly opposite the<br />
3d Battalion sector, w<strong>as</strong> reinforced by<br />
switching the 990th Regiment to the<br />
north to follow the 989th Regiment.<br />
More important, the 12th SS Panzer<br />
Division (which now had come up on<br />
the left of the 277th) parceled out some<br />
of its tanks to give weight to the infantry<br />
attack by the right wing of the 277th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division.<br />
The first tank entered the forest road<br />
from Hollerath, rolled to within ma-<br />
chine gun range of the Americans,<br />
stopped, then for twenty minutes me-<br />
thodically spewed bullet fire. Attempts<br />
to get a hit by artillery fire were futile,<br />
although the American shelling momen-<br />
tarily dispersed the accompanying infan-<br />
try and permitted a bazooka team to<br />
wreck one track. But even when crippled<br />
the single tank succeeded in immobiliz-<br />
ing the American infantry. Four more<br />
enemy tanks appeared. One w<strong>as</strong> knocked<br />
out by a bazooka round, but the rest<br />
worked forward along the network of<br />
two, 1st Lt. G. W. Jackman and 2d Lt. W. D.<br />
Markin, received the DSC, Lieutenant Markin<br />
posthumously.
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 99<br />
firebreaks and trails. 12 The combination<br />
of tanks and numerous infantry now<br />
threatened to er<strong>as</strong>e the entire 3d Battal-<br />
ion position. Ammunition had run low<br />
and the 3d Battalion c<strong>as</strong>ualties could not<br />
be evacuated.<br />
About 1030 Colonel Scott ordered the<br />
3d Battalion, 393d Infantry, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong><br />
its southern neighbor (the 1st), to re-<br />
move to new positions about one and<br />
a half miles e<strong>as</strong>t of Rocherath. This<br />
would be done by withdrawing the 3d<br />
Battalion through the 3d Battalion, 23d<br />
Infantry (the reinforcements sent by<br />
Robertson), which had dug in some<br />
thousand yards to its rear. All the vehi-<br />
cles available to the forward troops<br />
were filled with wounded. Fifteen<br />
wounded men, most too badly hurt to<br />
be moved, were left behind, together<br />
with the 3d Battalion surgeon, Capt.<br />
Frederick J. McIntyre, and some enlisted<br />
aid men. By noon the entire battalion<br />
had pulled out (disengaging without<br />
much difficulty) ; it p<strong>as</strong>sed through the<br />
3d Battalion, 23d Infantry, and two<br />
hours later w<strong>as</strong> on the new position.<br />
Allen’s battalion had fought almost con-<br />
tinuously since the early morning of the<br />
16th; then at full strength, it now w<strong>as</strong><br />
reduced to 475 men and all but two<br />
machine guns were gone.<br />
The 1st Battalion of the 393d Infantry<br />
had not been hard pressed during the<br />
morning of 17 December because the<br />
German forces in its area had been con-<br />
tent to move through the gap on the<br />
right, between the 393d and 394th.<br />
Ordered to withdraw about 1100, the<br />
battalion w<strong>as</strong> in position alongside<br />
12 The action at this point devolved on Sgt.<br />
Vernon McGarity and his squad. For outstanding<br />
heroism McGarity w<strong>as</strong> awarded the Medal of<br />
Honor.<br />
the 3d Battalion, 23d Infantry, by 1400,<br />
the two now forming a narrow front<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of the twin villages.<br />
The 3d Battalion, 23d Infantry (Lt.<br />
Col. Paul V. Tuttle, Jr.) , had been<br />
rushed to the western edge of the woods<br />
on the afternoon of the 16th for use <strong>as</strong><br />
a counterattack force. The hard-hitting<br />
German attack against the 3d Battalion,<br />
393d, on the following morning so dr<strong>as</strong>tically<br />
changed the situation that Colonel<br />
Tuttle’s orders were altered to:<br />
“hold at all costs.” His battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
none too well prepared for such defense,<br />
having arrived with no mines and very<br />
little ammunition. Trucks bringing ammunition<br />
forward found the road between<br />
Büllingen and Krinkelt barred by<br />
the enemy and never reached the battalion.<br />
Shortly after the troops from the 393d<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed through the battalion, Company<br />
I, on the open left flank, heard the clanking<br />
of tank treads. A few minutes later<br />
German tanks with marching infantry<br />
clustered around them struck the left<br />
platoon of Company I, rolling forward<br />
till their machine guns enfiladed the<br />
foxholes in which the American infantry<br />
crouched. Company I held until its ammunition<br />
w<strong>as</strong> nearly gone, then tried<br />
to withdraw to a nearby firebreak but<br />
went to pieces under fire raking it from<br />
all directions. 13 Company K, in line to the<br />
south, next w<strong>as</strong> hit. The company started<br />
an orderly withdrawal, except for the<br />
left platoon which had lost its leader<br />
and never got the order to pull back.<br />
This platoon stayed in its foxholes until<br />
the tanks had ground p<strong>as</strong>t, then rose to<br />
13 The gallant attempt by Pfc. Richard E. Cowan<br />
singlehandedly to cover the Company I retreat<br />
w<strong>as</strong> recognized by the award of the Medal of<br />
Honor.
100<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
CAMOUFLAGED PILLBOX IN THE FOREST serves <strong>as</strong> a regimental command post.<br />
engage the German infantry. The pla-<br />
toon w<strong>as</strong> wiped out.<br />
A medium tank platoon from the<br />
741st Tank Battalion, loaned by Robert-<br />
son, had arrived in the 3d Battalion area<br />
during the night. Lt. Victor L. Miller,<br />
the platoon leader, took two tanks to<br />
cover a forest crossroads near the Com-<br />
pany K position. In a duel at close quar-<br />
ters the American tanks destroyed two<br />
panzers, but in turn were knocked out<br />
and Lieutenant Miller w<strong>as</strong> killed.<br />
Parts of Company K held stubbornly<br />
together, fighting from tree to tree, with-<br />
drawing slowly westward. For courage in<br />
this fight, Pfc. Jose M. Lopez, machine<br />
gunner, w<strong>as</strong> awarded the Medal of<br />
Honor. This rear guard action, for the<br />
company w<strong>as</strong> covering what w<strong>as</strong> left of<br />
the battalion, went on until twilight.<br />
Then, <strong>as</strong> the survivors started to cross<br />
an open field, they were bracketed by<br />
artillery and Werfer fire and scattered.<br />
(Later the battalion would be given the<br />
Distinguished Unit Citation.) Company<br />
L, on the inner flank, had been given<br />
time for an orderly retreat; eighty or<br />
ninety men reached Krinkelt.<br />
The 3d Battalion of the 393d had<br />
barely started to dig in behind the 3d<br />
Battalion, 23d Infantry, when the first<br />
stragglers came back with word of the
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 101<br />
German <strong>as</strong>sault. Colonel Allen moved<br />
his spent battalion to a h<strong>as</strong>tily organized<br />
position 500 yards to the northwest and<br />
prepared to make another stand. The<br />
main force of the German attack, however,<br />
had angled away while rolling over<br />
the flank of the forward battalion. About<br />
this time the 3d Battalion, 393d, met a<br />
patrol from the 1st Battalion, 9th Infantry,<br />
which had been rushed to the<br />
Rocherath area to cover the 2d Division<br />
withdrawal south from Wahlerscheid,<br />
and the two battalions joined forces.<br />
The retreat of the 3d Battalion, 23d<br />
Infantry, left its right-flank neighbor,<br />
the 1st Battalion, 393d Infantry, completely<br />
isolated. 14 Telephone lines long<br />
since had been destroyed, and radio<br />
communication had failed. In late afternoon<br />
Major Legler decided to withdraw<br />
but hearing that the 2d Battalion of the<br />
394th w<strong>as</strong> to tie in on his right reversed<br />
his decision. About dark, however, the<br />
Germans struck in force and the rifle<br />
companies pulled back closer together.<br />
Because the battalion supply road w<strong>as</strong><br />
already in German hands, Legler and<br />
his men struck out across country on the<br />
morning of the 18th, taking a few vehicles<br />
and those of the wounded who could<br />
be moved. The main body reached<br />
Wirzfeld but the rear guard became<br />
separated, finally joining other Americans<br />
in the fight raging around Krinkelt.<br />
The 1st Battalion by this time numbered<br />
around two hundred men.<br />
The 395th Infantry Conforms<br />
to the Withdrawal<br />
The 395th Infantry, which had sup-<br />
14 Lt. Col. Paul V. Tuttle, Jr., for his able<br />
handling of the withdrawal by the 3d Battalion,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.<br />
ported the 2d Infantry Division attack<br />
in the Wahlerscheid sector, w<strong>as</strong> little<br />
affected on the 16th and the morning<br />
of the 17th by the German power drive<br />
against the rest of the 99th Division. In-<br />
formation reaching the 395th command<br />
post w<strong>as</strong> sparse and contradictory; both<br />
the 2d Division and the 395th still <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sumed that the battle raging to the south<br />
w<strong>as</strong> an answer to the American threat<br />
at Wahlerscheid, w<strong>here</strong> the 2d Division<br />
had made a sizable dent in the West<br />
Wall by evening of 16 December. 15<br />
All this time a chain reaction w<strong>as</strong> mov-<br />
ing slowly from the menaced southern<br />
flank of the 99th northward. It reached<br />
the 395th before noon on 17 December<br />
with word that the 324th Engineer Bat-<br />
talion, stationed between that regiment<br />
and the 393d, w<strong>as</strong> moving back to the<br />
west. Actually the engineers had not yet<br />
withdrawn but had moved to make con-<br />
tact with and cover the exposed flank<br />
of the 395th, this apparently on General<br />
Lauer’s orders while the 395th w<strong>as</strong> tak-<br />
ing orders from Robertson. The with-<br />
drawal of the 2d Infantry Division to<br />
the Rocherath area resulted in the attach-<br />
ment of the 395th (reinforced by the<br />
2d Battalion of the 393d) to General<br />
Robertson’s division. Now the battalions<br />
were ordered to blow up all of the pill-<br />
boxes taken in the advance. Finally, at<br />
1600, Col. Alexander J. Mackenzie re-<br />
ceived a retirement order given by Gen-<br />
eral Lauer or General Robertson, which<br />
one is uncertain. The plan w<strong>as</strong> this. The<br />
two battalions of the 395th and the at-<br />
tached battalion from the 393d would<br />
fall back toward the regimental com-<br />
mand post at Rocherath. From this<br />
15 For details of the Wahlerscheid attacks, see<br />
MacDonald, The Siegfried Line Campaign, pp.<br />
606–10.
102 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
point the regiment would deploy to<br />
cover the road leading out of Rocherath<br />
to the north and northe<strong>as</strong>t, the road<br />
which the 2d Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
using in its march south from the<br />
Wahlerscheid battlefield.<br />
The 1st Battalion reached Rocherath<br />
and on General Robertson’s orders en-<br />
trenched on both sides of the road north<br />
of the village. Heavy weapons were drag-<br />
ged through the deep mud and were<br />
placed to cover the road. The other two<br />
battalions dug in along a perimeter<br />
which faced e<strong>as</strong>t from Rocherath and<br />
the Wahlerscheid road. So emplaced, the<br />
395th waited for the enemy to come<br />
pouring through the woods onto the 2d<br />
Division route of withdrawal.<br />
On the opposite side of the 2d Divi-<br />
sion corridor, in the Höfen area, the<br />
enemy made no serious move on 17<br />
December to repeat the dis<strong>as</strong>trous attack<br />
of the previous day. The immediate ob-<br />
jective of the 326th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division remained the high ground<br />
northwest of Monschau near Mützenich.<br />
General K<strong>as</strong>chner apparently decided on<br />
17 December to make his bid for a break-<br />
through directly in this sector and to<br />
abandon momentarily the attempt to<br />
force a penetration between Monschau<br />
and Höfen.<br />
About 0400 on 17 December the 38th<br />
Cavalry Squadron outposts north of<br />
Monschau heard enemy troops moving<br />
along the draw running west from Men-<br />
zerath. Quick and accurate response by<br />
American batteries ended this move.<br />
Three hours later the German batteries<br />
opened up, shelling the thin line of<br />
troopers deployed along the railroad cut<br />
north of Monschau. When the guns and<br />
Werfers ce<strong>as</strong>ed, a wave of German in-<br />
fantry headed for the railroad tracks.<br />
They were checked by machine gun fire,<br />
but more Germans appeared, extending<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sault front from the north edge of<br />
Monschau to the hill beyond Mützenich.<br />
American fire power–artillery, tank de-<br />
stroyers, tank guns, and the numerous<br />
machine guns—stopped the first attack.<br />
But by 0900 the enemy had succeeded<br />
in gathering a battalion on the north<br />
flank, poised against the Troop B front<br />
3,400 yards along the railroad line e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Mützenich Hill. In short rushes the<br />
enemy filtered into the Troop B area.<br />
Even the Luftwaffe took a hand; at le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
two squadrons made strafing runs over<br />
the cavalry positions. Although some<br />
Germans broke through the thin cavalry<br />
line, a sharp shelling administered by<br />
the 62d Field Artillery Battalion stopped<br />
the main support troops short of the rail-<br />
road. More Germans could be seen <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembling in Imgenbroich, but friendly<br />
aircraft were on the way to help the<br />
cavalry. Gunners from the 62d marked<br />
the village with red smoke and the<br />
fighter-bombers went in bombing and<br />
strafing. This ended the daylight ph<strong>as</strong>e<br />
of the fray. Company A of the 47th In-<br />
fantry, which regiment w<strong>as</strong> en route to<br />
the sector from Eupen, had appeared in<br />
time to help hunt down the Germans<br />
who had got through the cavalry line.<br />
Despite prisoner reports that the 326th<br />
would throw in a regimental attack<br />
during the afternoon, quiet reigned.<br />
The 47th Infantry arrived at Mützenich<br />
and bivouacked <strong>as</strong>tride the Eupen road<br />
-the immediate threat w<strong>as</strong> ended. The<br />
38th Squadron could report a count of<br />
two hundred German dead in front of<br />
its lines. The 326th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> finding its position at the<br />
pivot of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> offensive<br />
a costly one.
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 103<br />
The 2d Division Gives Up the<br />
Wahlerscheid Attack<br />
On the night of 16–17 December the<br />
enemy counterattacked at Wahlerscheid.<br />
Actually the number of enemy troops<br />
available for use against the 2d Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> very small, too few for any telling<br />
maneuver out of the West Wall position.<br />
The bulk of the 272d Yolks Grenadier<br />
Division, holding the sector, had been<br />
thrown in to stop the American 78th<br />
Division farther north. The 326th<br />
Yolks Grenadier Division w<strong>as</strong> already<br />
engaged in a costly attempt to penetrate<br />
the American lines at Monschau and<br />
Höfen. As a result the defense at the<br />
Wahlerscheid road junction had been<br />
conducted on a catch-<strong>as</strong>-catch-can b<strong>as</strong>is<br />
by troops farmed out for brief periods<br />
prior to commitment in the counter-<br />
offensive. On 15 December, for example,<br />
elements of the 990th Regiment (277th<br />
Yolks Grenadier Division) were relieved<br />
by a reinforced battalion of the 751st<br />
Regiment (326th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion), which, during the night of 15–16<br />
December, w<strong>as</strong> in the process of being<br />
relieved by the Replacement Battalion<br />
of the 326th. By coincidence the 2d Di-<br />
vision attack on the night prior to the<br />
16th engaged and detained troops which<br />
both the 277th and 326th expected to use<br />
elsew<strong>here</strong> on the first day of the counter-<br />
offensive.<br />
On the afternoon of 16 December Maj.<br />
Gen. Leonard T. Gerow, commanding<br />
the V Corps, concluded from the frag-<br />
mentary reports coming out of the main<br />
battle area that the 2d Infantry Division<br />
might soon find itself in a difficult sit-<br />
uation. He <strong>as</strong>ked the First <strong>Army</strong> com-<br />
mander, General Hodges, for permission<br />
to call off the attack at Wahlerscheid and<br />
GENERAL GEROW<br />
move the 2d Division to the natural de-<br />
fensive line offered by the ridge run-<br />
ning north and south of Elsenborn. This<br />
w<strong>as</strong> refused. Late in the evening the<br />
deputy corps commander (Maj. Gen.<br />
Clarence R. Huebner) cautioned Gen-<br />
eral Robertson to keep the unengaged<br />
troops of his division in hand for a quick<br />
change of plan, despite the order to con-<br />
tinue the attack. 16 By this time the three<br />
battalions of the 9th Infantry and two<br />
of the 38th were committed. On the<br />
16 The 2d Division attack and subsequent fight-<br />
ing withdrawal are very well covered in combat<br />
interviews. In this chapter the following after<br />
action reports and journals have been used: 2d<br />
Div; 9th, 23d, and 38th Infantry Regiments; the<br />
2d Div Hq Commandant. The 644th Tank De-<br />
stroyer Bn. <strong>Army</strong> Ground Forces Report No. 559<br />
(26 January 1945) is useful. The published ma-<br />
terials, <strong>History</strong> of the Fifteenth Field Artillery<br />
Battalion in the European Theater of Operations<br />
and D plus 106 to V-E: The Story of the 2d<br />
Division (n.d.n.p.), are of little value.
104 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
morning of the counteroffensive’s second<br />
day, with the American position in the<br />
99th Division and VIII Corps sector rap-<br />
idly deteriorating, Gerow renewed his<br />
request. The First <strong>Army</strong> commander<br />
w<strong>as</strong> unwilling to give orders for a with-<br />
drawal but authorized the V Corps com-<br />
mander to act <strong>as</strong> he saw fit. Gerow<br />
phoned Robertson; it w<strong>as</strong> now about<br />
0730.<br />
For the first time the 2d Division com-<br />
mander learned that the enemy had<br />
broken through the 99th and that his<br />
own division w<strong>as</strong> in danger of being<br />
cut off. Gerow’s order w<strong>as</strong> to set up a<br />
defensive position on the Elsenborn<br />
ridge—but first the 2d Division had to<br />
withdraw from the exposed Wahler-<br />
scheid sector. The immediate t<strong>as</strong>k con-<br />
fronting Robertson w<strong>as</strong> that of<br />
gathering what troops he could to de-<br />
fend the single road back through<br />
Krinkelt-Rocherath to Wirtzfeld, while<br />
at the same time holding open the one-<br />
track road between Wirtzfeld and El-<br />
senborn. 17 Two-thirds of his reserve, the<br />
23d Infantry, would be attached to the<br />
99th Division. The rifle strength of the<br />
two regiments around Wahlerscheid had<br />
been reduced by nearly 1,200 men. The<br />
1st Battalion of the 9th Infantry, for<br />
example, had begun the Wahlerscheid<br />
attack on 13 December with 35 officers<br />
and 678 men; on the morning of 17<br />
December the active roster w<strong>as</strong> 22 officers<br />
and 387 men. All of the original com-<br />
pany commanders and most of the pla-<br />
toon leaders were c<strong>as</strong>ualties. Fortunately,<br />
the tank and tank destroyer strength at-<br />
17 The 2d Division engineers had worked 011<br />
this secondary road until it offered a fairly p<strong>as</strong>sable<br />
single track.<br />
tached to support the 2d Division attack<br />
had been held in reserve well to the<br />
south in order to prevent a jam on<br />
the single communicating road during<br />
the infantry ph<strong>as</strong>e of the operation and<br />
so constituted a readily available reserve.<br />
But the appearance of German armor<br />
early on 17 December would force some<br />
piecemeal distribution to meet this<br />
threat.<br />
Even before the withdrawal order<br />
reached the 2d Division command post<br />
at Wirtzfeld on the morning of the 17th,<br />
German tanks had been spotted moving<br />
on Büllingen the main division supply<br />
point. General Robertson ordered the<br />
headquarters commandant to prepare a<br />
defense at the division command post<br />
(a few hundred yards north of Büllin-<br />
gen) and sent his only free rifle battal-<br />
ion, the 2d of the 23d Infantry, south<br />
from the Rocherath area. After the rap-<br />
ture of Büllingen the German column<br />
turned away to the southwest, but a re-<br />
connaissance party composed of a tank<br />
platoon and a few riflemen in half-tracks<br />
continued in the direction of Wirtzfeld.<br />
They had been anticipated by only a few<br />
minutes with the arrival of a self-pro-<br />
pelled gun platoon from C Company of<br />
the 644th Tank Destroyer Battalion.<br />
When the Germans reached the ridge<br />
south of Wirtzfeld they were momen-<br />
tarily profiled against the sky line.<br />
Two of the American tank destroyers<br />
and a 57-mm. gun accounted for three<br />
of the panzers and a half-track. For the<br />
time being the threat to the southern<br />
terminus of the 2d Division line of with-<br />
drawal w<strong>as</strong> ended. The 2d Battalion, 23d<br />
Infantry, and additional tank destroyers<br />
from the 644th soon arrived and de-<br />
ployed in the deep snow south of Wirtz-<br />
feld on the slope facing Büllingen t<strong>here</strong>
THE SIXTH PANZER ARMY 105<br />
to watch the 1st SS Panzer Regiment <strong>as</strong><br />
it filed southwest.<br />
The 394th Infantry Abandons the<br />
Mürringen Position<br />
E<strong>as</strong>t of German-held Büllingen the<br />
American troops in Mürringen faced en-<br />
circlement, occupying <strong>as</strong> they did a pre-<br />
carious and jutting angle between the<br />
defense forming on the evening of 17<br />
December around the twin villages and<br />
the southern shoulder bracing at But-<br />
genbach. The sole road remaining for<br />
withdrawal to the Elsenborn <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
area ran back through Krinkelt, the<br />
southernmost of the twin villages, whose<br />
tenure by friendly troops w<strong>as</strong> none too<br />
certain on the night of the 17th. The<br />
chances for a successful withdrawal from<br />
Mürringen were dwindling by the hour.<br />
The 37 1st Field Artillery Battalion,<br />
which had been firing in support of the<br />
394th from battery positions close by,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> out of ammunition. Colonel<br />
Riley, the regimental commander, re-<br />
ported this to General Lauer at 0115<br />
on the 18th, adding that he recom-<br />
mended “withdrawal.” The division<br />
commander at once sent a radio message<br />
back: “Withdraw arty. Your order. Your<br />
time.” Apparently Lauer expected that<br />
the 394th Infantry and Hightower’s bat-<br />
talion from the 23d Infantry would send<br />
off the guns and then consolidate with<br />
the Krinkelt defenders. About this time<br />
Hightower arrived at Riley’s command<br />
post and told him of his conversation<br />
with Colonel Hirschfelder. Hightower<br />
had just talked with one of his ambu-<br />
lance drivers who had come back from<br />
Wirtzfeld via the road through Krinkelt<br />
and said he could guide the vehicles out.<br />
Colonel Riley now decided to evade the<br />
closing jaws of the German trap by mov-<br />
ing out through Krinkelt and retiring,<br />
if possible, to Elsenborn. The ambulance<br />
driver would join the head of the column<br />
and Hightower’s trucks would fall in be-<br />
hind the vehicles of the 394th.<br />
Shortly after midnight the remnants<br />
of the 394th Infantry at Mürringen<br />
formed in two columns, one composed<br />
of foot troops, the other made up of the<br />
remaining vehicles. Colonel Riley<br />
started the motor column, which in-<br />
cluded Hightower’s vehicles, along the<br />
road toward Krinkelt at 0215, a road<br />
beaten by hostile shellfire. Near Krin-<br />
kelt, whence came the sound of heavy<br />
firing, the column halted while scouts<br />
moved toward the houses at the edge of<br />
the village. Here German tanks were<br />
seen, and so orders were p<strong>as</strong>sed along to<br />
abandon the vehicles and move west on<br />
foot to Elsenborn. The infantry column<br />
started a quarter of an hour after the<br />
vehicles, marching quietly toward Krin-<br />
kelt along a tree-covered draw, carrying<br />
only helmets, overcoats, rifles, and am-<br />
munition. Debouching onto the road<br />
south of Krinkelt, the infantry found it<br />
lined with deserted trucks and jeeps.<br />
After some indecision the infantry<br />
manned a few of the empty vehicles-<br />
by this time it had been <strong>as</strong>certained that<br />
the 2d Infantry Division had at le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
partial control of Krinkelt–and edged<br />
their way through the village and out<br />
the Wirtzfeld road. Most of the men<br />
from Mürringen reached Elsenborn<br />
during the 18th. The 371st Field Ar-<br />
tillery Battalion, which had displaced<br />
closer to Krinkelt during the night,<br />
failed to get its heavy equipment out of<br />
the snow when a second move w<strong>as</strong><br />
ordered at daylight, and all but five<br />
howitzers were abandoned.
106 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remains to account for the<br />
394th’s 2d Battalion, which had been<br />
cut off from the regiment while in the<br />
Honsfelder Wald, and the 1st Battalion<br />
of the 23d, attached to the 394th and<br />
holding Hünningen, the southernmost<br />
position left to the 2d and 99th Divi-<br />
sions. In the Honsfelder Wald the 2d<br />
Battalion of the 394th met the 1st Bat-<br />
talion of the 393d; both were out of com-<br />
munication with their parent regiments<br />
and neither knew the location of neigh-<br />
boring units. Jointly deciding to with-<br />
draw further to the west, the two units<br />
began their march at daylight on the<br />
18th. Diverted by the sound of intense<br />
firing in the direction of Krinkelt, they<br />
marched toward Mürringen.<br />
Almost in the shadow of the houses<br />
the force got a hostile reception: the<br />
Germans had moved in on the heels of<br />
the 394th. At this critical juncture radio<br />
contact w<strong>as</strong> made with a friendly unit,<br />
probably the 2d Division, and in answer<br />
to the plea for help American shells be-<br />
gan exploding in the village. Between<br />
the confusion and the morning fog, the<br />
Americans were able to break away,<br />
turning this time toward Wirtzfeld. They<br />
carried <strong>as</strong> many of their wounded <strong>as</strong><br />
they could, but some of the wounded had<br />
to be left behind in the care of two aid<br />
men. En route to Wirtzfeld the group<br />
suddenly w<strong>as</strong> brought under fire by the<br />
2d Division artillery, a number of c<strong>as</strong>u-<br />
alties resulting. At this point the men<br />
nearly panicked, but order w<strong>as</strong> restored<br />
while a squad leader raced ahead to a<br />
friendly outpost and stopped the shell-<br />
ing. Most of the weary, hungry troops<br />
reached Elsenborn during the early<br />
hours of 19 December. Cap. Robert<br />
McGee, S–3 of the 2d Battalion, 394th,<br />
had brought out about 570 officers and<br />
men. The 1st Battalion, 393d, which had<br />
been badly hurt in the first two days of<br />
the fight, w<strong>as</strong> less fortunate. Fewer than<br />
300 of its officers and men were left.<br />
The 1st Battalion, 23d Infantry, at<br />
HUnningen, it will be recalled, had re-<br />
ceived radio orders late on the 17th<br />
which put it under the command of the<br />
9th Infantry. Colonel Hightower’s bat-<br />
talion w<strong>as</strong> closely engaged, for the Ger-<br />
mans had filtered through at a number<br />
of points, and when the order came to<br />
withdraw from the village the battalion<br />
had to fight its way free. Company B,<br />
most exposed, w<strong>as</strong> under <strong>as</strong>sault even <strong>as</strong><br />
the withdrawal began. A platoon leader<br />
w<strong>as</strong> wounded in front of the foxhole<br />
line; two aid men tried to reach him and<br />
were killed. A third reached the side of<br />
the fallen officer, then both were killed.<br />
The 3d Platoon, whose radio w<strong>as</strong> gone,<br />
had no word <strong>as</strong> to the time when the<br />
battalion w<strong>as</strong> pulling back. Runners who<br />
tried to reach the platoon were killed or<br />
captured, and this part of Company B<br />
w<strong>as</strong> lost. Most of the badly depleted 1st<br />
Battalion withdrew in accordance with<br />
an earlier plan along a secondary road<br />
via Mürringen which had been scouted<br />
by the battalion medical officer, the ve-<br />
hicles following the 394th and the men<br />
on foot marching cross-country to Wirtz-<br />
feld.
CHAPTER VI<br />
The German Northern Shoulder<br />
Is Jammed<br />
The 2d Division Withdraws<br />
General Robertson’s plan for moving<br />
his 2d Division south w<strong>as</strong> to “skin the<br />
cat,” pulling the most advanced bat-<br />
talions in the Wahlerscheid sector back<br />
through the others. In addition to the<br />
main supply road, a part of the division<br />
could use the secondary route running<br />
more or less parallel to the Wahler-<br />
scheid road until the two met at a fork<br />
about a mile north of Rocherath. (See<br />
Map 11.) The 395th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> in the<br />
woods e<strong>as</strong>t of the northernmost section<br />
of the 2d Division withdrawal route and<br />
would provide cover for the first stage<br />
of the tricky move parallel to and close<br />
behind the rapidly deteriorating front.<br />
Then too the enemy at the Wahlerscheid<br />
road junction seemed hardly strong or<br />
aggressive enough to make even a day-<br />
light disengagement difficult.<br />
The danger zone would be the twin<br />
villages. Roads from the e<strong>as</strong>t led into<br />
Rocherath and Krinkelt. And, to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, <strong>as</strong> information from the 99th Divi-<br />
sion rifle battalions warned, the Ger-<br />
mans had made a deep penetration and<br />
were liable at any moment to come<br />
bursting out of the forest. Rocherath and<br />
Krinkelt had to be held if the 2d Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> to reach the Elsenborn position<br />
intact and with its heavy weapons and<br />
vehicles. The 99th Division had long<br />
since thrown its l<strong>as</strong>t reserve into the<br />
battle; t<strong>here</strong>fore the 2d Division (with<br />
the attached 395th) alone had to provide<br />
for the defense of this endangered sec-<br />
tor of the corridor south.<br />
The 2d Division commander <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
responsibility to his officers <strong>as</strong> follows. 1<br />
Col. Chester J. Hirschfelder, command-<br />
ing the 9th Infantry, w<strong>as</strong> charged with<br />
the actual withdrawal from Wahler-<br />
scheid. The <strong>as</strong>sistant division com-<br />
mander, Col. John H. Stokes, Jr., took<br />
over the defense of Rocherath. Col.<br />
Philip D. Ginder, <strong>as</strong>signed to the divi-<br />
sion <strong>as</strong> a spare regimental commander,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> given the t<strong>as</strong>k of establishing a<br />
blocking position southe<strong>as</strong>t of Wirtzfeld<br />
-the village at which the 2d Division<br />
would have to turn toward Elsenborn.<br />
General Robertson himself would spend<br />
the crucial hours of the 17th working up<br />
and down the Rocherath road, gathering<br />
additional troops w<strong>here</strong> he could, inter-<br />
vening to change the disposition of<br />
battalions and even companies <strong>as</strong> the<br />
complexion of the battle altered.<br />
The men turning south were con-<br />
cerned with a fight for their lives. Some<br />
units of the division would be able to<br />
1 General Robertson, however, maintained per-<br />
sonal control of the battle and w<strong>as</strong> in the thick<br />
of the fight. He received the DSC.
108 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
occupy their <strong>as</strong>signed positions and en-<br />
trench before the enemy struck. Others<br />
would have to attack in order to take<br />
their designated place in the new line of<br />
resistance. Meanwhile the rumor that<br />
American prisoners were being butch-<br />
ered in cold blood by SS troops w<strong>as</strong><br />
spreading like wildfire through the 2d<br />
Division, a partial explanation of the<br />
bitter fight finally made at the twin<br />
villages.<br />
Robertson’s order, “withdraw at<br />
once,” reached the 9th Infantry a little<br />
after 1000. By 1100 the 2d Battalion had<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembled and started south, with the 3d<br />
and 1st Battalions forming in that order<br />
to complete the column. The withdrawal<br />
from the front lines, shielded by a heavy<br />
barrage laid on the West Wall positions,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> accomplished readily but of course<br />
took much time. The 1st Battalion,<br />
2D DIISION INFRYMEN ON THE MARCH<br />
bringing up the rear of the 9th Infantry<br />
column, did not set out until 1415.<br />
Before the five battalions at Wahler-<br />
scheid commenced to disengage, General<br />
Robertson marched his only reserve, the<br />
3d Battalion of the 38th Infantry, south<br />
through Rocherath and Krinkelt. At this<br />
time in the morning the imminent Ger-<br />
man threat w<strong>as</strong> in the area north of<br />
Büllingen. For this re<strong>as</strong>on Robertson<br />
placed the 3d Battalion (–) at the south-<br />
ern edge of Krinkelt, w<strong>here</strong>, by 1130, it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> entrenched. One rifle company, plus<br />
the antitank and service companies, took<br />
positions around Rocherath guarding the<br />
roads entering the village from the north<br />
and e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
The redeployment of the 2d Division<br />
had a double aim: securing a firm hold<br />
on Wirtzfeld, essential to the control of<br />
the road net in the final ph<strong>as</strong>e of the
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 109<br />
move to Elsenborn, and defending Krin-<br />
kelt and Rocherath until such time <strong>as</strong><br />
both the 2d and 99th Divisions could be<br />
withdrawn to the Elsenborn ridge. The<br />
9th Infantry, leading the move, w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
concentrate the bulk of its troops around<br />
Wirtzfeld; the 38th, to build up a de-<br />
fensive line at Krinkelt-Rocherath <strong>as</strong> its<br />
battalions arrived. Before dark the 2d<br />
Battalion of the 9th Infantry had tra-<br />
versed the seven and a half miles of con-<br />
gested and shell-torn road, deploying<br />
south of Wirtzfeld in line with the 2d<br />
Battalion of the 23d Infantry. The 3d<br />
Battalion, next in the 9th Infantry col-<br />
umn, arrived after dark and dug in be-<br />
tween the two battalions already south<br />
of Wirtzfeld. En route the 2d Division<br />
commander had detached Company K<br />
and sent it posth<strong>as</strong>te to the line forming<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t of Rocherath and to the rear<br />
of the fragmented 3d Battalion, 393d.<br />
Through the afternoon the prospect of a<br />
large-scale German armored attack from<br />
Büllingen had loomed large in the cal-<br />
culations of both General Robertson and<br />
General Lauer. Fortunately the attack<br />
failed to come.<br />
In the late afternoon two rifle bat-<br />
talions were on their way to Krinkelt and<br />
Rocherath: the 1st Battalion of the 9th<br />
Infantry (Lt. Col. William D. McKin-<br />
ley) cleared the Wahlerscheid area at<br />
1415; the 1st Battalion of the 38th Infan-<br />
try (Lt. Col. Frank T. Mildren) started<br />
on its way at 1530. The road south w<strong>as</strong><br />
now under German shellfire, going w<strong>as</strong><br />
slow, and only a short span of daylight<br />
remained. The danger involved in the<br />
movement across the front multiplied<br />
with each hour, for the 99th Division<br />
center, e<strong>as</strong>t of the twin villages, w<strong>as</strong><br />
collapsing.<br />
On the road General Robertson met<br />
Colonel McKinley and told him that he<br />
had just come from the command post<br />
of the 395th Infantry w<strong>here</strong> he had<br />
learned that the Germans had broken<br />
through the 393d. Robertson had split<br />
the preceding battalion of the 9th Infan-<br />
try to send a rifle company and part of<br />
the headquarters company to bar the<br />
main road from the forest into Roche-<br />
rath. Now he ordered McKinley to rush<br />
his battalion to Rocherath and hold the<br />
woods road “until ordered to with-<br />
draw.” At dusk the 1st Battalion w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
position, deployed on a slight rise over-<br />
looking a shallow depression from which<br />
a gradual <strong>as</strong>cent led into the forest.<br />
A thick fog lay close to the snow-cov-<br />
ered ground. Around w<strong>as</strong> a scene of wild<br />
confusion, stragglers with and without<br />
arms hurrying along the road and across<br />
the fields, the sound and fl<strong>as</strong>h of gun-<br />
fire coming from the woods to the e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
Company K, now attached to the 1st Bat-<br />
talion, already w<strong>as</strong> north of the road,<br />
backed up by three guns from the 644th<br />
Tank Destroyer Battalion. Company C<br />
closed beside K; Company B dug in<br />
at the road; Company A lay to the south.<br />
The battalion had not picked up its<br />
mines during the disengagement, but<br />
w<strong>as</strong> able to get a few from the tank<br />
destroyers for use at the road. T<strong>here</strong><br />
were fifteen extra bazook<strong>as</strong> on the am-<br />
munition vehicles, and these were<br />
handed to riflemen earlier trained by<br />
McKinley <strong>as</strong> bazooka men. Forward ob-<br />
servers from the 15th Field Artillery<br />
Battalion hurriedly set up their com-<br />
munications. In the woods, less than a<br />
thousand yards away, firing continued<br />
<strong>as</strong> darkness closed over the American po-<br />
sition.<br />
Friendly infantry and tanks were<br />
known to be coming west. About 1930
110 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
three tanks and a platoon or so of in-<br />
fantry came through Company B. They<br />
had p<strong>as</strong>sed on toward Rocherath before<br />
anyone realized that this w<strong>as</strong> the first<br />
of the enemy. Half an hour later more<br />
tanks came clanking along the road, the<br />
dark shapes of infantrymen following.<br />
This time Company B took no chances.<br />
The first two German tanks struck the<br />
American mines. Then two more tried<br />
to swing off the road, only to be knocked<br />
out by bazooka fire. By this time the Ger-<br />
mans were milling about, apparently<br />
completely surprised, while the 15th<br />
Field Artillery Battalion added to the<br />
confusion by beating the road close to<br />
the 1st Battalion foxholes. It took the<br />
enemy an hour or so to reorganize. Then<br />
five or six German tanks attacked in<br />
line, rolling to within a couple of hun-<br />
dred yards of the foxhole line w<strong>here</strong><br />
they halted and fired for nearly half an<br />
hour. Next the accompanying infantry<br />
rushed in, but were cut down by the<br />
heavy machine guns on the final pro-<br />
tective line. Finally the enemy tankers<br />
and riflemen got together in an <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
that broke through.<br />
The 1st Battalion refused to panic and<br />
set to work with bazook<strong>as</strong> against the<br />
flanks of the blinded tanks. One of the<br />
panzers w<strong>as</strong> crippled, but the crew com-<br />
partment proved impervious to bazooka<br />
rounds (perhaps this w<strong>as</strong> a Tiger). So<br />
Cpl. Charles Roberts (Company D) and<br />
Sgt. Otis Bone (Company B) drained<br />
some g<strong>as</strong>oline from an abandoned ve-<br />
hicle, doused the tank, and lit the whole<br />
with thermite grenades. When German<br />
tanks moved into the Company A area,<br />
American artillery responded to the ur-<br />
gent call for help and within three min-<br />
utes dropped in a concentration that<br />
stopped the <strong>as</strong>sault. Meanwhile the<br />
American gunners, firing from new em-<br />
placements near Camp Elsenborn, had<br />
effectively checked further troop moves<br />
on the road from the forest, seven bat-<br />
talions finally joining in the shoot. By<br />
midnight all w<strong>as</strong> quiet in front of the<br />
1st Battalion except for the distant cr<strong>as</strong>h<br />
of friendly artillery-around the fox-<br />
holes the silence w<strong>as</strong> “frightening.”<br />
Stubborn determination, mines, ma-<br />
chine guns, and bazook<strong>as</strong> had checked<br />
this first series of <strong>as</strong>saults, but the battal-<br />
ion commander would credit the gun-<br />
ners at Elsenborn with saving his<br />
battalion. 2<br />
It will be recalled that the 1st Bat-<br />
talion of the 38th Infantry had started<br />
south shortly after the departure of the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t troops of the 9th Infantry. The ac-<br />
tual withdrawal w<strong>as</strong> screened by the 2d<br />
Battalion of the 38th, the final covering<br />
force of the 2d Division, and w<strong>as</strong> aided<br />
by fire and smoke laid down by the 37th<br />
Field Artillery Battalion, 81-mm. and 4.<br />
2-inch mortars. On the road the regi-<br />
mental executive officer met Colonel<br />
Mildren and explained the 1st Battalion<br />
mission: to go into the line forming at<br />
the twin villages on the left of the 3d<br />
Battalion, 38th Infantry, e<strong>as</strong>t and north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Krinkelt. Mildren learned in<br />
addition that the battalion probably<br />
would have to fight its way to the <strong>as</strong>-<br />
signed position a jarring note that<br />
ple<strong>as</strong>ed none this close to nightfall.<br />
About a thousand yards north of<br />
2 For e<strong>as</strong>e of description this engagement h<strong>as</strong><br />
been treated <strong>as</strong> a fight by the 1st Battalion; notice,<br />
however, that the 1st deployed alongside Com-<br />
pany K. Pfc. William A. Soderman, of Company<br />
K, stopped three enemy tanks with bazooka rounds<br />
during the night of battle but w<strong>as</strong> badly wounded<br />
by machine gun fire from the l<strong>as</strong>t tank he at-<br />
tacked. Soderman w<strong>as</strong> awarded the Medal of<br />
Honor.
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 111<br />
Rocherath the battalion column came to hold won more Germans appeared <strong>as</strong> the<br />
a crossroads which had been picked <strong>as</strong> a night went on. The fight for Krinkelt<br />
profitable target for the enemy artillery surged back and forth, building to buildand<br />
Werfers. Company A at the head of ing, hedgerow to hedgerow. Men on both<br />
the column p<strong>as</strong>sed safely, but the rest sides were captured and recaptured <strong>as</strong> the<br />
came into a gantlet of the most severe tide of battle turned. A German attempt<br />
shelling the veteran battalion ever had to seize the heavy-walled church on the<br />
encountered. Company C, third in the northern edge of the village w<strong>as</strong> beaten<br />
serial, suffered most and became badly off by the reconnaissance company of the<br />
disorganized. German tanks were near 644th Tank Destroyer Battalion, which<br />
the crossroads and might have cut into had lost a platoon at Büllingen during<br />
the American infantry had not T/4 the morning. The communications offi-<br />
Truman Kimbro placed mines across the cer of the 1st Battalion, 38th Infantry, 1st<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern entry. Kimbro w<strong>as</strong> killed, after Lt. Jesse Morrow, knocked out a tank<br />
having been hit innumerable times. He with only a rifle grenade. (Morrow later<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the Medal of Honor post- w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.) The situation in<br />
humously.<br />
Krinkelt w<strong>as</strong> further confused by re-<br />
The leading company, now alone, treating troops from the 99th Division,<br />
entered Rocherath at dusk but found no intermixed <strong>as</strong> they were with the infilguides<br />
and marched on through the next trating enemy. One German, using a capvillage<br />
until met by bullet fire. Twice tured American to give the p<strong>as</strong>sword, got<br />
the company doubled back on its trail p<strong>as</strong>t two outposts, but a sentry finally<br />
until finally found by the battalion ex- killed both men. At midnight a column<br />
ecutive and directed to the proper po- of 99th Infantry vehicles started pouring<br />
sition. Company B arriving about 2130, through the town and continued the rest<br />
moved in on the left of Company A but of the night.<br />
w<strong>as</strong> still on the surface (not having had At Rocherath, the Germans who had<br />
time to intrench) when German tanks so boldly entered the village earlier in<br />
and infantry struck from the northe<strong>as</strong>t at the evening destroyed three American<br />
Krinkelt. Company A, well dug in and tanks <strong>as</strong> these inched their way out of<br />
with all its weapons emplaced, let the the village to help Company K of the<br />
tanks roll p<strong>as</strong>t and then took on the in- 38th Infantry. Here too the fight w<strong>as</strong><br />
fantry. Its neighbor, Company B, ex- bitter and confused. At one time a<br />
posed and without its supporting battalion commander of the 38th w<strong>as</strong><br />
weapons, w<strong>as</strong> riddled, only one platoon reported to have men from sixteen<br />
managing to escape. The Company B different companies fighting under his<br />
survivors, joined by what w<strong>as</strong> left of command. By midnight, however, the<br />
Company C, fell back to the regimental enemy tanks behind the American lines<br />
command post in Rocherath and joined had been accounted for and the German<br />
the antitank company in the street fight infantrymen captured or killed.<br />
raging t<strong>here</strong>.<br />
When the wild night of fighting drew<br />
Back at Krinkelt three German tanks to a close, the Americans still were in<br />
with infantry clinging to their decks got control of the two villages and the near<br />
into the e<strong>as</strong>tern streets; with this foot- sector of the Wahlerscheid withdrawal
112 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
route. The rear guard 2d Battalion of the<br />
38th had made a highly successful with-<br />
drawal and w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembled a half mile<br />
north of Rocherath. The 395th Infantry<br />
had moved back <strong>as</strong> ordered and, thus<br />
far in good shape, held the left flank of<br />
the 2d Division northe<strong>as</strong>t of Rocherath<br />
<strong>as</strong>tride the two approaches to the<br />
fork above the village. (It had left<br />
the 324th Engineer Battalion isolated<br />
on Rath Hill, however, and when the<br />
engineers started west on the morning of<br />
the 18th they came under fire from both<br />
the 395th and the enemy.) Straggler<br />
lines were operating around the twin<br />
villages and a start w<strong>as</strong> being made at<br />
regrouping the strays and tying to-<br />
gether the bits and pieces of the Ameri-<br />
can line. Wirtzfeld, the one good escape<br />
hatch to Elsenborn, w<strong>as</strong> ready for a de-<br />
fense in force. The 2d Division artillery<br />
and its reinforcing battalions had dis-<br />
placed to the Elsenborn ridge in positions<br />
within range of the entire front. General<br />
Robertson's 2d Division and attached<br />
troops had carried through a highly com-<br />
plex maneuver in the face of the enemy,<br />
disengaging in a fortified zone, withdraw-<br />
ing across a crumbling front, then wheel-<br />
ing from column to secure and organize<br />
a defensive line in the dark and under<br />
attack. Having completed this mission,<br />
the 2d Division w<strong>as</strong> under orders to hold<br />
in place while the remnants of the 99th<br />
Division right wing p<strong>as</strong>sed through to<br />
Elsenborn; then it w<strong>as</strong> to break away and<br />
re-form for the defense of the Elsenborn<br />
ridge.<br />
The appearance of the 2d Infantry<br />
Division at the twin villages probably<br />
came <strong>as</strong> a complete surprise to the Ger-<br />
man command. German intelligence had<br />
failed completely <strong>as</strong> regards the location<br />
of this division and believed that it w<strong>as</strong><br />
in reserve at Elsenborn. Peculiarly<br />
enough, the fact that the 2d w<strong>as</strong> attack-<br />
ing through the 99th positions never w<strong>as</strong><br />
reported to the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> head-<br />
quarters. Dietrich expected, t<strong>here</strong>fore, to<br />
break through the 99th and meet the 2d<br />
somew<strong>here</strong> to the rear or possibly to<br />
the right rear of the 99th. This may<br />
explain the German failure to attempt<br />
an end run and drive for Elsenborn.<br />
The 1st Infantry Division Sends<br />
Reinforcements to Butgenbach<br />
The advance guard of the 1st SS Pan-<br />
zer Division had reached Büllingen on<br />
the early morning of 17 December, by<br />
its presence threatening the open right<br />
flank and the rear of the 99th Division.<br />
Although the German armored column<br />
veered southwest, under the eyes of the<br />
<strong>as</strong>tonished Americans, the presence of<br />
the enemy this deep within the bare<br />
south flank w<strong>as</strong> a cause of grave concern<br />
to General Lauer and later to General<br />
Robertson. Through the morning only<br />
a handful of engineers and headquarters<br />
personnel, backed up with single tank<br />
destroyer and antiaircraft pieces, stood<br />
in the way of a German d<strong>as</strong>h north across<br />
the American rear. But the 1st SS Pan-<br />
zer, intent on objectives far to the west,<br />
failed to make this play. 3 A platoon<br />
of Mark IV tanks did scout the Butgen-<br />
bach road but withdrew when three were<br />
destroyed by the few guns of Company<br />
3 The history of the fight against the 1st SS<br />
Panzer during the first few days of the advance<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the subject of a special report, b<strong>as</strong>ed on<br />
personal interviews in January 1945, by Capt.<br />
Franklin Ferriss (in OCMH). Coverage on the<br />
German side is good, notably MSS # A–924<br />
(Kraemer), A–877 (Priess), and B–733, 12th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division, 1–29 December 1944<br />
(Generalleutnant Gerhard Engel) .
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 113<br />
B, 6 12th Tank Destroyer Battalion,<br />
which Capt. John J. Kennedy had<br />
implaced near Dom Butgenbach.<br />
Reinforcements from the 1st Infantry<br />
Division, <strong>as</strong> promised by the VII Corps,<br />
arrived at Camp Elsenborn about 0900,<br />
reported to the 99th Division, and were<br />
dispatched at once toward Butgenbach.<br />
This village lay on high ground belong-<br />
ing to the vital Elsenborn ridge and<br />
would be the point of entry for any Ger-<br />
man thrust on the road net north of Bull-<br />
ingen. 4<br />
The 26th Infantry (Col. John F. R.<br />
Seitz) , which had been transferred to<br />
V Corps control the previous midnight,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the only unit thus far sent south by<br />
the 1st Division. At Elsenborn, after<br />
General Lauer had given a quick re-<br />
sumé of the situation, the regimental ex-<br />
ecutive officer, then in command, put<br />
the 2d Battalion in the lead, sending<br />
it south to occupy two hills midway be-<br />
tween Butgenbach and Büllingen which<br />
overlooked the main road connecting<br />
the two villages. By dusk the 2d Battalion<br />
(Lt. Col. Derrill M. Daniel) w<strong>as</strong> de-<br />
ployed on the high ground near the tiny<br />
hamlet of Dom Butgenbach, dug in<br />
along the reverse slopes on a 2,100-yard<br />
front. Both flanks were wide open. The<br />
enemy, however, failed to react force-<br />
fully to the American move, although<br />
a 2d Battalion patrol found that the<br />
Germans still were in Büllingen. The<br />
26th Infantry ultimately would be hit<br />
4 The actions fought <strong>here</strong> by the 26th Infantry<br />
involved very heavy fighting by attached tanks<br />
and tank destroyers. See especially the AAR’s of<br />
the 741st and 745th Tank Battalions; the 634th,<br />
703d, and 801st Tank Destroyer Battalions. See<br />
also Capt. D. E. Rivette, “The Hot Corner at<br />
Dom Butgenbach,” Infantry Journal (October,<br />
1945), pp. 19–23.<br />
and hit hard, but not until the German<br />
plans for shattering the e<strong>as</strong>tern front of<br />
the 99th and 2d Divisions had failed.<br />
The night of 17 December p<strong>as</strong>sed un-<br />
eventfully except for the booming of the<br />
guns of the 33d Field Artillery Battalion<br />
and 413th Antiaircraft Gun Battalion<br />
firing from their positions with the 26th<br />
Infantry against the hostile traffic stream-<br />
ing through Büllingen.<br />
Early the following morning small<br />
enemy detachments appeared in the<br />
Dom Butgenbach area but showed no<br />
inclination to close with the Americans.<br />
The 26th Infantry had been busy during<br />
the night completing its deployment: the<br />
3d Battalion now w<strong>as</strong> dug in west of<br />
Wirtzfeld on the left of the 2d Battalion,<br />
which retained the responsibility for<br />
blocking the Büllingen-Butgenbach<br />
road; the 1st Battalion w<strong>as</strong> in reserve<br />
around Butgenbach; and considerable<br />
artillery and tank destroyer strength re-<br />
inforced the command. In anticipation<br />
of an all-out German attack at this<br />
critical section of the American front,<br />
the V Corps truckhead at Butgenbach<br />
w<strong>as</strong> closed and all rations and g<strong>as</strong>oline<br />
were evacuated. Farther to the west,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> no defense had yet formed, the<br />
Robertville ammunition supply point,<br />
holding six thousand tons, suspended<br />
operations and moved to the rear. But<br />
through the 18th the enemy showed no<br />
sign of any earnest intent in front of the<br />
26th Infantry.<br />
The Defense of the Twin Villages<br />
18 December<br />
The German attempt to take Krinkelt<br />
and Rocherath during the night of 17–<br />
18 December had not been well co-<br />
ordinated, carried out <strong>as</strong> it w<strong>as</strong> by the
26TH INFANTRY AREA NEAR BUTGENBACH. Above, 1st Battalion en route to the village;<br />
below, troops positioning antitank gun.
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 115<br />
advance guards of two divisions<br />
attacking piecemeal in the dark<br />
over unknown terrain against re-<br />
sistance which w<strong>as</strong> completely surprising.<br />
By the morning of 18 December, how-<br />
ever, the enemy strength had incre<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
substantially despite the miserable state<br />
of the woods roads leading to the twin<br />
villages. The 989th Regiment of the<br />
277th Volks Grenadier Division (prob-<br />
ably reinforced by a third battalion) had<br />
reached Rocherath. The 12th SS Panzer<br />
Division, whose tanks and armored in-<br />
fantry carriers made extremely slow<br />
progress on the muddy secondary roads-<br />
quickly chewed up by churning tracks-<br />
w<strong>as</strong> able by dawn to <strong>as</strong>semble the 25th<br />
Panzer Grenadier Regiment, an <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
gun battalion, and one full tank bat-<br />
talion e<strong>as</strong>t of the villages. During the<br />
18th this force w<strong>as</strong> strengthened by one<br />
more tank battalion, the final armored<br />
commitment being about equally di-<br />
vided between Panther tanks and the<br />
heavy Tigers.<br />
The American strength at Krinkelt<br />
and Rocherath w<strong>as</strong> substantial and by<br />
daylight on 18 December w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>suming<br />
a cohesive defensive pattern <strong>as</strong> the bat-<br />
talions reorganized after the race south<br />
and the confused night battle. Most of<br />
the 38th Infantry (Col. Francis H. Boos)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> in and around the two villages, plus<br />
about a battalion and a half of the 9th<br />
Infantry and a few platoons of the 23d<br />
Infantry (Col. Jay B. Loveless). Al-<br />
though these 2d Division troops had gap-<br />
ing ranks, so had their opponents. For-<br />
tunately, in view of the number of tanks<br />
ready in the German camp, the Amer-<br />
ican infantry had the means of antitank<br />
defense at hand: the 741st Tank Battal-<br />
ion, 644th Tank Destroyer Battalion, a<br />
company of the 612th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion, and a few guns from the 801st<br />
Tank Destroyer Battalion. On Elsen-<br />
born ridge, but well within supporting<br />
range, lay the 2d Division artillery<br />
(which had displaced after firing from<br />
extreme forward positions), the bulk of<br />
the 99th Division artillery, and some<br />
corps field artillery battalions. The flanks<br />
of the 2d Division position at the villages<br />
were more or less covered by elements of<br />
the 9th and 23d Infantry in Wirtzfeld,<br />
to the southwest, and the battalions of<br />
the 393d deployed in blocking positions<br />
to hold the road net north of Rocherath.<br />
As yet, however, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no homo-<br />
geneous line sealing the 2d Division<br />
front, and the men and vehicles of the<br />
99th Division still p<strong>as</strong>sing through to the<br />
west complicated the problem of co-or-<br />
dinating the defense and artillery fire.<br />
An ominous quiet prevailed around<br />
Rocherath during the early, dark hours<br />
of 18 December, but just before first<br />
light the enemy resumed the <strong>as</strong>sault, this<br />
time employing his tanks and infantry in<br />
ordered company. The 1st Battalion of<br />
the 9th Infantry, deployed e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
village along the road from the woods,<br />
took the first blow. Apparently a com-<br />
pany of tanks had been brought close<br />
to the American line during the night<br />
battle, and these now attacked with more<br />
than a battalion of infantry. While the<br />
batteries on Elsenborn ridge furiously<br />
shelled the road, a confused fight spread<br />
all along the foxhole line. The morning<br />
fog w<strong>as</strong> heavy, visibility almost nil. The<br />
American infantry let the tanks roll p<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
then tailed them with bazook<strong>as</strong> or turned<br />
to meet the oncoming infantry at close<br />
quarters with grenades, and even bay-<br />
onets or knives. This first <strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong><br />
beaten off, while a number of the Ger-<br />
man tanks were crippled or destroyed
116 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
by bazooka teams stalking successfully<br />
under cover of the fog.<br />
When the fog lifted about 0830, three<br />
German tanks rolled right along the fox-<br />
hole line firing their machine guns while<br />
the German infantry rushed forward. Lt.<br />
Stephen P. Truppner of Company A<br />
radioed that his company had been over-<br />
run and <strong>as</strong>ked for artillery to fire on his<br />
own position. For thirty minutes an<br />
American battalion shelled this area.<br />
Only twelve men escaped. Company K,<br />
which had been attached to the battalion<br />
the day before, likewise w<strong>as</strong> engulfed.<br />
Capt. Jack J. Garvey, sending a l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
message from the cellar of the house<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> his command post, refused<br />
to leave because he could not get his<br />
company out. Ten men and one officer<br />
escaped. On the left Companies B and<br />
C were able to hold their ground; a<br />
few from Company B broke and ran but<br />
were sent back by the battalion com-<br />
mander.<br />
The German wave carried tanks and<br />
infantry inside Rocherath, the fight<br />
eddying from house to house, wall to<br />
wall, along streets and down narrow<br />
alleys. Tanks fought tanks; men were<br />
captured, then captured again. Mean-<br />
while, Colonel Boos did what he could<br />
to form some defense behind what w<strong>as</strong><br />
left of the 1st Battalion of the 9th. 5<br />
He radioed Colonel McKinley that <strong>as</strong><br />
soon <strong>as</strong> the 2d Battalion of the 38th<br />
could swing into position, a matter of<br />
an hour or more, the 1st Battalion<br />
should withdraw. With his remaining<br />
two companies transfixed by direct tank<br />
5 Here Sgt. James L. Bayliss manned his machine<br />
gun to cover his men although he had been under<br />
fire by a German tank. Finally he w<strong>as</strong> killed by<br />
a tank-gun round. Bayliss w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.<br />
fire and surrounded by German in-<br />
fantry, McKinley replied that no with-<br />
drawal w<strong>as</strong> possible unless friendly tanks<br />
or tank destroyers arrived. “Miracu-<br />
lously,” <strong>as</strong> the 1st Battalion later re-<br />
ported, a platoon of Sherman tanks came<br />
into view. This w<strong>as</strong> a part of A company,<br />
741st Tank Battalion, which had been<br />
patrolling the Wahlerscheid road.<br />
When the platoon commander w<strong>as</strong><br />
<strong>as</strong>ked if he wanted to do some fighting<br />
the reply w<strong>as</strong> profanely affirmative.<br />
First the tanks joined the infantry in a<br />
counterattack to reach the positions<br />
which had been held by Companies A<br />
and K. Two of the three German tanks<br />
which had been har<strong>as</strong>sing the battalion<br />
were destroyed by the Shermans, but no<br />
contact w<strong>as</strong> made with the lost com-<br />
panies. A second counterattack by the<br />
tank platoon covered the 1st Battalion<br />
withdrawal, but the l<strong>as</strong>t riflemen out<br />
had the Germans yelling at their heels.<br />
The shattered battalion withdrew<br />
through the 2d Battalion of the 38th,<br />
fell back to Rocherath, and then<br />
marched to Krinkelt, w<strong>here</strong> it billeted in<br />
a deserted hotel. Approximately 240 offi-<br />
cers and men were left of the orig-<br />
inal battalion and its attached units. In<br />
addition to the nearly total loss of Com-<br />
panies A and K, all of the Company<br />
M machine gunners attached to the 1st<br />
Battalion were missing in action. <strong>Of</strong> the<br />
group that had been rushed in the pre-<br />
vious evening from Headquarters Com-<br />
pany, 3d Battalion, only thirteen were<br />
left. It seems probable that the entire<br />
989th Regiment had been employed in<br />
wresting the road to Rocherath from the<br />
stubborn 1st Battalion; the fight had<br />
gone on for nearly six hours and had<br />
given the 38th Infantry time to regroup<br />
to meet the enemy drive. Colonel Boos
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 117<br />
gratefully acknowledged that this gallant<br />
stand had saved his regiment.<br />
The 3d Battalion of the 393d, after<br />
hard fighting on the 17th, had with-<br />
drawn northe<strong>as</strong>t of Rocherath and tied<br />
in sketchily on the left of the 1st Bat-<br />
talion, 9th Infantry. Colonel Allen’s bat-<br />
talion w<strong>as</strong> about half strength and had<br />
lost all of its machine guns, mortars, and<br />
antitank guns. The furious morning<br />
attack against the 1st Battalion, with a<br />
tank platoon in the lead, also struck the<br />
3d Battalion. Unable to combat the tanks<br />
although one w<strong>as</strong> hit by a bazooka round,<br />
the battalion fell back a thousand yards<br />
to the northwest. Good radio communi-<br />
cation with the 395th allowed its cannon<br />
company to take a hand effectively, cover-<br />
ing the retirement and discouraging close<br />
pursuit. About noon Allen’s men were<br />
ordered to Wirtzfeld, then on to the line<br />
forming at Elsenborn.<br />
Although enemy tanks and foot troops<br />
had penetrated <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the 38th com-<br />
mand post inside Rocherath, they<br />
were successfully hunted out during the<br />
morning. The Germans continued to<br />
hammer along the forest road, striving<br />
to win free entrance to the village, but<br />
they found the 2d Battalion of the 38th<br />
(Lt. Col. Jack K. Norris) , now standing<br />
in the way, a tough opponent. The most<br />
successful <strong>as</strong>sault of the afternoon forced<br />
the 2d Battalion to retire “one hedge-<br />
row.”<br />
The battle for Krinkelt, if it can be<br />
separated from that raging around<br />
Rocherath, commenced sometime be-<br />
fore dawn when five tanks and a body<br />
of infantry moved cautiously up to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern edge of the village. When the<br />
enemy tankers halted to confer with their<br />
infantry escort, Company L, 23d Infan-<br />
try, which had been placed in the line<br />
after its retreat from the woods the<br />
evening before, killed some forty of the<br />
Germans and the panzers decamped. A<br />
brief period of quiet followed and dur-<br />
ing this lull the foot detachment of the<br />
394th from Mürringen p<strong>as</strong>sed through<br />
the American lines en route to Wirtzfeld<br />
and Elsenborn. By 0830, however, the<br />
fight for Krinkelt w<strong>as</strong> on in earnest. A<br />
number of attacks were checked by<br />
shellfire before they could make much<br />
headway. Nonetheless, a tank platoon<br />
penetrated <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the 1st Battalion,<br />
38th Infantry, command post before it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> destroyed, and a few German tanks<br />
got <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the road south to Wirtzfeld.<br />
In this quarter, <strong>as</strong> at Rocherath, the<br />
American tanks, tank destroyers, and<br />
bazooka teams left the German tanks<br />
smoking and broken. 6<br />
During the night of 18 December,<br />
the 2d Division still held the twin vil-<br />
lages while the l<strong>as</strong>t organized units of the<br />
99th Division moved west on their way<br />
to Elsenborn. In the dark, German<br />
bazooka teams crept along walls and<br />
hedgerows seeking the hiding places<br />
of the American tanks and tank de-<br />
stroyers which had done so much to foil<br />
the armored attacks during the day. The<br />
panzers again made forays into the vil-<br />
lages, made their kills, and in turn were<br />
destroyed.<br />
Although the American hold in this<br />
sector remained firm, some of the con-<br />
fusion and loss of control normally in-<br />
<strong>here</strong>nt in a tactical situation like that<br />
faced by the 2d and 99th Divisions w<strong>as</strong><br />
beginning to tell. Orders from the 99th<br />
Division had been addressed to the 394th<br />
6 During the fighting. in the twin villages on<br />
the 18th, 1st Lt. R. A. Parker destroyed or<br />
immobilized six enemy tanks with a rocket<br />
launcher. Parker w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.
118<br />
Infantry, at 0808, stressing that the reg-<br />
iment w<strong>as</strong> not to withdraw to Elsenborn<br />
but instead should take position south<br />
of Krinkelt beside the 38th Infantry. The<br />
main body of the 394th already had<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed through Krinkelt by that hour<br />
and probably never received the order<br />
until it arrived at Elsenborn.<br />
Confused communications also had<br />
an impact in the area held by the 395th<br />
Infantry on the north flank. General<br />
Robertson, about 0200 on the morning<br />
of the 18th, had radioed the 395th In-<br />
fantry to maintain contact with the 38th<br />
but to prepare for a move to Elsenborn.<br />
Thus far the enemy had made no move<br />
to strike the 395th positions in force.<br />
A radio message reached the 395th com-<br />
mand post about 1600 ordering the reg-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
CAPTURED GERMAN TANK CREWMAN<br />
iment to withdraw to Elsenborn. The<br />
move began while Colonel Mackenzie<br />
went on to the 99th Division head-<br />
quarters at Elsenborn to report. Here<br />
he w<strong>as</strong> informed that no such order<br />
had been sent (it had been sent but<br />
w<strong>as</strong> garbled) and General Lauer told<br />
him that his battalions must be sent<br />
back to their positions at once. Mac-<br />
kenzie w<strong>as</strong> able to reach two battalions<br />
on the road and turn them back, but the<br />
1st Battalion, 395th, had arrived in El-<br />
senborn before word could reach it. The<br />
countermarch w<strong>as</strong> made successfully and<br />
the old positions reoccupied at 0500 on<br />
19 December. Information that the 395th<br />
had left, denuding the north flank,<br />
reached the 38th Infantry commander<br />
during the night and caused much con-
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 119<br />
cern. But the 990th Volks Grenadier<br />
Regiment, at the forest edge e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
395th positions, either had failed to<br />
notice the withdrawal or had been un-<br />
willing to make a move with darkness<br />
settling.<br />
The L<strong>as</strong>t Attack at Höfen Fails<br />
18 December<br />
Ten miles by road north of Krinkelt<br />
and Rocherath the 3d Battalion, 395th<br />
Infantry, fought an isolated but impor-<br />
tant engagement on 18 December. 7<br />
Having failed the day before to breach<br />
the American cavalry line at Mon-<br />
schau, the 326th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion turned again toward Höfen w<strong>here</strong><br />
it had encountered such a sharp reverse<br />
on the first day of the German counter-<br />
offensive. The 2d Battalion of the 753d<br />
Regiment finally had rejoined the di-<br />
vision; so General K<strong>as</strong>chner put this<br />
regiment in the van, nourishing his<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault waves with companies of the re-<br />
maining two regiments <strong>as</strong> the fight<br />
developed. Some three hours before day-<br />
break the German <strong>as</strong>sault detachments<br />
moved forward from the hills surround-<br />
ing Höfen to make a first test of the<br />
American defenses at the northern edge<br />
of the village. Well prepared for such<br />
an onslaught, concentrated artillery and<br />
mortar fire blanketed the ground over<br />
which the grenadiers had to advance.<br />
Despite heavy c<strong>as</strong>ualties from this fire<br />
the enemy broke through to the village.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> followed a confused battle, but<br />
when day broke the l<strong>as</strong>t Germans were<br />
being routed from the houses.<br />
7 The 3d Battalion of the 395th Infantry w<strong>as</strong><br />
given a Presidential Citation for its fight at<br />
Höfen. Sgt. T. E. Piersall and Pfc. Richard Mills<br />
fought with such conspicuous courage <strong>as</strong> to receive<br />
the DSC.<br />
The first daylight <strong>as</strong>sault came about<br />
0900 preceded by a barrage of artillery,<br />
rocket, and mortar fire. Advancing<br />
through a thick haze, ten tanks, seven<br />
armored cars, and an infantry battalion<br />
made for the village. Once more the de-<br />
fensive gun concentrations made great<br />
play in the gray ranks. The 3-inch tank<br />
destroyers of the 612th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion, although frozen in place, held<br />
the German fighting vehicles at bay-<br />
even with the limited traverse. As be-<br />
fore, some of the attackers broke<br />
through. Colonel Butler phoned the<br />
forward observer of the 196th Field Ar-<br />
tillery Battalion, whose little party w<strong>as</strong><br />
fighting off Germans around its observa-<br />
tion post (a three-story brick building<br />
right in the forward line) , and <strong>as</strong>ked for<br />
three five-minute concentrations on his<br />
own positions. 8 The shells came in<br />
promptly. As the fire finally lifted But-<br />
ler sent his reserve, a single platoon of I<br />
Company, into the counterattack. Pick-<br />
ing up strength at the foxhole line, the<br />
Americans drove the remaining foe back<br />
in the direction of Rohren. The German<br />
tanks, whose appearance had caused the<br />
3d Battalion to request help “at once,’’<br />
took a singularly small part in the fray,<br />
retiring behind a ridge which gave<br />
shelter against direct antitank fire. It<br />
must be said that the German grena-<br />
diers were of sterner stuff. The Ameri-<br />
can main line of resistance w<strong>as</strong> not com-<br />
pletely re-established until 1230. When<br />
night came the Germans tried once<br />
again but to no avail.<br />
Thus ended the enemy plan to carry<br />
the northern pivot of the Sixth Panzer<br />
8 This w<strong>as</strong> 2d Lt. S. D. Llewellyn, who later re-<br />
ceived the DSC for the defense of the observation<br />
post.
120<br />
<strong>Army</strong> offensive <strong>as</strong> far forward <strong>as</strong> Eupen.<br />
K<strong>as</strong>chner had planned to shift his attack<br />
later in the day toward Monschau, but<br />
this attack never w<strong>as</strong> made. The bloody<br />
failure at Höfen gives a more than ade-<br />
quate explanation. German dead liter-<br />
ally were piled in front of the 3d<br />
Battalion. The disparity in losses suffered<br />
by the combatants is amazing. The Ger-<br />
man dead counted in and around Höfen<br />
numbered 554; prisoners numbered 53.<br />
The American c<strong>as</strong>ualties were five killed<br />
and seven wounded. From this time<br />
on the 326th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
abandoned all but minor action in this<br />
sector, finally turning south to take a<br />
secondary role in the ensuing battle at<br />
the Elsenborn ridge. Höfen and Mons-<br />
chau remained in American hands<br />
through the rest of the Ardennes Cam-<br />
paign.<br />
The 2d Division Withdraws<br />
to the Elsenborn Line<br />
19 December<br />
At 1800 on 18 December the V Corps<br />
commander attached General Lauer’s<br />
99th Division to Robertson’s 2d Divi-<br />
sion. General Gerow’s instructions,<br />
given Robertson late on 17 December<br />
for a defense of the Rocherath-Krinkelt-<br />
Wirtzfeld line until such time <strong>as</strong> the<br />
isolated American troops to the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
could be withdrawn, finally were ful-<br />
filled on the night of 18–19 December<br />
when the remnants of the 1st Battalion<br />
of the 393d and the 2d Battalion of the<br />
394th came back through the 2d Divi-<br />
sion lines. These were the l<strong>as</strong>t organized<br />
units to find their way to safety, although<br />
small groups and individual stragglers<br />
would appear at the Elsenborn rallying<br />
point for some days to come. Then, de-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
spite the fact that the 2d Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
hard pressed, Robertson made good on<br />
his promise to the corps commander that<br />
he would rele<strong>as</strong>e the 99th Division ele-<br />
ments which had been placed in the 2d<br />
Division line and send them to Elsen-<br />
born for reorganization within their own<br />
division. The tactical problem remain-<br />
ing w<strong>as</strong> to disengage the 2d Division<br />
and its attached troops, particularly<br />
those in the twin villages, while at the<br />
same time establishing a new and solid<br />
defense along the Elsenborn ridge.<br />
The failure to break through at the<br />
twin villages on 18 December and so<br />
open the way south to the main armored<br />
route via Büllingen had repercussions all<br />
through the successive layers of German<br />
command on the Western Front.<br />
Realizing that the road system and the<br />
terrain in front of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
presented more difficulties than those<br />
confronting the Fifth, it had been<br />
agreed to narrow the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
zone of attack and in effect ram through<br />
the American front by placing two pan-<br />
zer corps in column. The southern wing<br />
of the 1st SS Panzer Corps, in the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> van, had speedily punched<br />
a hole between the 106th and 99th<br />
American divisions and by 18 December<br />
the leading tank columns of the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division were deep in the Amer-<br />
ican rear are<strong>as</strong>. The northern wing,<br />
however, had made very slow progress<br />
and thus far had failed to shake any<br />
tanks loose in a d<strong>as</strong>h forward on the<br />
northern routes chosen for armored pen-<br />
etration. Peremptory telephone messages<br />
from the headquarters of OB WEST har-<br />
<strong>as</strong>sed Dietrich, the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
commander, all during the 18th and were<br />
repeated–doubtless by progressively<br />
sharpening voices–all the way to the
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 121<br />
99TH DIVISION VEHICLES MOVING THROUGHH WIRTZFELD en route to Elsenborn.<br />
Krinkelt-Rocherath front. But exhorta-<br />
tion had been fruitless.<br />
Although Dietrich continued to nee-<br />
dle his subordinates to get the right wing<br />
of the army rolling forward, he also<br />
sought to remedy the situation by chang-<br />
ing the I SS Panzer Corps tactics. Diet-<br />
rich suggested to General Priess that the<br />
12th SS Panzer Division disengage,<br />
swing south, byp<strong>as</strong>s Butgenbach, and get<br />
back onto the main route some place<br />
west of the thorny American position.<br />
The I SS Panzer Corps commander and<br />
his staff politely rejected this idea on the<br />
grounds that the byroads were imp<strong>as</strong>s-<br />
able and that Krinkelt, Rocherath, and<br />
Butgenbach must be cleared to open the<br />
better road net. Eventually Dietrich pre-<br />
vailed—or some compromise w<strong>as</strong><br />
reached–for late on 18 December ar-<br />
mored elements of the 12th SS Panzer<br />
Division began to withdraw from the<br />
twin villages, while the 3d Panzer Gren-<br />
adier Division, which had been sched-<br />
uled for the fight at Monschau, marched<br />
west from reserve to take over the battle<br />
with the 2d Division.<br />
The German plans for 19 December<br />
were these: the 277th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division and advancing troops of the<br />
3d Panzer Grenadier Division were to<br />
continue the attack at Krinkelt and
122 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Rocherath; the 89th Regiment, 12th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division, which had<br />
come up from reserve and initiated an<br />
attack from Mürringen against Krinkelt<br />
the day before, w<strong>as</strong> to maintain pressure<br />
in this sector. Meanwhile, the 12th SS<br />
Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong> to complete its<br />
withdrawal from the twin villages and<br />
move <strong>as</strong> quickly <strong>as</strong> the poor roads would<br />
allow to join a kampfgruppe of the 12th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division in a thrust<br />
against the American flank position at<br />
Butgenbach. The direction of the Ger-<br />
man main effort, <strong>as</strong> a result, would shift,<br />
substituting an armored thrust against<br />
the flank for the battering-ram frontal<br />
attack against the now well-developed<br />
defenses in the area of Krinkelt-Roch-<br />
erath. Fresh German infantry were en<br />
route to the twin villages, and some<br />
reinforcements would be employed<br />
t<strong>here</strong> on the 19th, but the attack would<br />
lack the armored weight whose momen-<br />
tum had carried earlier <strong>as</strong>sault waves<br />
into the heart of the American positions.<br />
At dawn, on 19 December, and blank-<br />
eted in thick fog, the German grena-<br />
diers advanced on Krinkelt and Roche-<br />
rath. The batteries back on Elsenborn<br />
ridge once again laid down a defensive<br />
barrage, ending the attack before it<br />
could make any headway. Another<br />
advance, rolling forward under an in-<br />
coming fog about 1000, placed enemy<br />
snipers and machine gunners close to the<br />
American positions. Shortly after noon a<br />
few German tanks churned toward the<br />
villages and unloaded machine gunners<br />
to work the weapons on derelict tanks<br />
which had been abandoned close to the<br />
American foxhole line. Apparently the<br />
enemy infantry were edging in <strong>as</strong> close<br />
<strong>as</strong> they could in preparation for a final<br />
night <strong>as</strong>sault. Headlong <strong>as</strong>sault tactics<br />
were no longer in evidence, however. In<br />
the meantime the defenders picked up<br />
the sounds of extensive vehicular move-<br />
ment (representing the departing ele-<br />
ments of the 12th SS Panzer Division),<br />
and a platoon of tanks appeared north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Rocherath but quickly retired<br />
when artillery concentrations and direct<br />
fire were brought to bear.<br />
Inside the twin villages’ perimeter<br />
the defenders were aware that a ph<strong>as</strong>e<br />
of the battle w<strong>as</strong> ending. Colonel Stokes,<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sistant division commander, w<strong>as</strong><br />
preparing plans for withdrawal to the<br />
Elsenborn lines. Colonel Boos had the<br />
38th Infantry and its attached troops at<br />
work quietly destroying the weapons and<br />
equipment, German and American,<br />
which could not be evacuated. Finally, at<br />
1345, the withdrawal order w<strong>as</strong> issued,<br />
to be put in effect beginning at 1730.<br />
The 395th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> to retire from its<br />
lines north of the villages and move<br />
cross-country (by a single boggy trail)<br />
west to Elsenborn. The 38th Infantry<br />
and its attached units, more closely<br />
engaged and in actual physical contact<br />
with the enemy, would break away from<br />
the villages, fall back west through<br />
Wirtzfeld, then move along the tem-<br />
porary road which the 2d Division<br />
engineers had constructed between<br />
Wirtzfeld and Berg. Once the 38th<br />
had cleared through the Wirtzfeld posi-<br />
tion, now held by elements of the 9th<br />
Infantry and a battalion of the 23d, it<br />
would occupy a new defensive line west<br />
and northwest of Wirtzfeld, while the<br />
9th Infantry in turn evacuated that vil-<br />
lage.<br />
Company officers commanding troops<br />
facing the enemy had been carefully<br />
briefed to avoid the word “withdrawal”<br />
in final instructions to their men. This
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 123<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to be “a move to new positions”;<br />
all were to walk, not run. Col. Leland<br />
W. Skaggs’ 741st Tank Battalion, tank<br />
destroyers from the 644th Tank De-<br />
stroyer Battalion, and the 2d Division<br />
engineers would form a covering force<br />
in the villages, laying mines and beating<br />
off any attempt at “pursuit.” Disengage-<br />
ment w<strong>as</strong> made from left to right,<br />
“stripping” the 2d Division line from<br />
Rocherath to Wirtzfeld. First, the 2d<br />
Battalion of the 38th Infantry pulled out<br />
of the north edge of Rocherath; the 1st<br />
Battalion, deployed in both villages,<br />
followed; the 3d Battalion tacked on at<br />
Krinkelt. A half hour later, just <strong>as</strong> the<br />
Germans moved into Rocherath, Com-<br />
pany C of the 644th and Company B of<br />
the 741st hauled out, the tanks carrying<br />
the engineers. The move through Wirtz-<br />
feld, now in flames, brought the 38th<br />
under German guns and resulted in<br />
some c<strong>as</strong>ualties and confusion, but at<br />
0200 on 20 December the rear guard<br />
tank platoon left Wirtzfeld and half an<br />
hour later the 9th Infantry p<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
through the new lines occupied by the<br />
38th Infantry a thousand yards west of<br />
the village.<br />
The four-day battle which had pitted<br />
the 2d Infantry Division and the 99th<br />
Infantry Division against the spearheads<br />
of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> had cost both<br />
sides heavily in men and materiel. But<br />
in the balance sheet for this desperate<br />
initial ph<strong>as</strong>e of the German counteroffen-<br />
sive, w<strong>here</strong> lives weighed less than hours<br />
won or lost, the reckoning w<strong>as</strong> favorable<br />
to the Americans. What the fruitless bid<br />
for a quick decision had cost the Ger-<br />
mans in terms of dead and wounded h<strong>as</strong><br />
no accounting. The losses of the un-<br />
tried 99th Division, fighting its first<br />
major action under circumstances far<br />
more difficult than w<strong>as</strong> the lot of most<br />
American infantry divisions in the Eu-<br />
ropean Theater of Operations, have<br />
been compiled only <strong>as</strong> a total for the<br />
whole month of December. A careful<br />
check shows that the 99th had few c<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ualties prior to 16 December or after 19<br />
December; nine-tenths or more of the<br />
following list, t<strong>here</strong>fore, represents the<br />
cost of four days of battle: 14 officers and<br />
119 men killed in action; 53 officers and<br />
1,341 men missing in action; 51 of-<br />
ficers and 864 men wounded in action.<br />
About 600 officers and men p<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
through the division clearing station be-<br />
fore 20 December <strong>as</strong> nonbattle c<strong>as</strong>ual-<br />
ties; half were trench foot c<strong>as</strong>es.<br />
The veteran 2d Division had taken<br />
considerable punishment from exposure<br />
and battle loss beginning on 13 Decem-<br />
ber with the start of the Wahlerscheid<br />
operation. It is impossible to determine<br />
the ratio between the c<strong>as</strong>ualties suffered<br />
in the first four days of attack and those<br />
of the final three days of defense. In-<br />
deed no total is available for the 2d<br />
Division during these important seven<br />
days. The 23d Infantry, in reserve be-<br />
fore 16 December and then committed<br />
by battalion, sustained these battle<br />
losses: 1st Battalion, 10 officers and 221<br />
men; 2d Battalion, 1 officer and 100<br />
men; 3d Battalion, 10 officers and 341<br />
men. The 9th Infantry, which w<strong>as</strong> en-<br />
gaged both at Wahlerscheid and the<br />
twin villages, lists 47 officers and men<br />
killed, 425 wounded, and 192 missing.<br />
The regiment likewise had lost nearly<br />
600 officers and men <strong>as</strong> nonbattle c<strong>as</strong>ual-<br />
ties (trench foot, respiratory dise<strong>as</strong>es in-<br />
duced by exposure, fatigue, and related<br />
causes) , a figure which tells something<br />
of the cost of lengthy battle in snow,<br />
damp, and mud, but also reflects the
124<br />
high incidence of nonbattle c<strong>as</strong>es in a<br />
veteran unit whose ranks are filled with<br />
troops previously wounded or hospital-<br />
ized-often more than once. The bitter<br />
character of the initial twenty-four<br />
hours of the 2d Division fight to oc-<br />
cupy and hold Krinkelt and Rocherath,<br />
after the march south, is mirrored in the<br />
battle losses taken by the 38th Infantry<br />
in that critical period: 389 officers and<br />
men were missing (many of them killed<br />
in action but not so counted since the<br />
Americans subsequently lost the battle-<br />
ground) ; 50 wounded were evacuated;<br />
and 11 were counted <strong>as</strong> killed in action.<br />
In the three days at the twin villages<br />
the 38th Infantry suffered 625 c<strong>as</strong>ual-<br />
ties.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
The defense of Krinkelt and Roche-<br />
rath, so successful that by the second day<br />
many officers and men believed that the<br />
sector could be held against all attack,<br />
is a story of determination and skilled<br />
leadership in a veteran command. But<br />
more than that, the American battle <strong>here</strong><br />
exemplifies a high order of co-ordination<br />
and co-operation (typed though these<br />
terms have become) between the ground<br />
arms. Although the infantry almost sin-<br />
glehandedly secured the ground and held<br />
it for the first few hours, the main Ger-<br />
man <strong>as</strong>saults were met and checked by<br />
infantry, tanks, tank destroyers, and ar-<br />
tillery. The men of the 2d Division had<br />
on call and within range ample artillery<br />
support. Communications between the<br />
GUN POSITION ON ELSENBORN RIDGE
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 125<br />
firing battalions on Elsenborn ridge<br />
and the rifle companies in buildings and<br />
foxholes functioned when needed-<br />
although the losses suffered among the<br />
artillery forward observers were unu-<br />
sually high. Artillery throughout this<br />
fight offered the first line of antitank de-<br />
fense, immobilizing many panzers be-<br />
fore they reached the foxhole line,<br />
leaving them with broken tracks and<br />
sprocket wheels like crippled geese in<br />
front of the hunter. The 155-mm. bat-<br />
teries were best at this work. The<br />
accuracy and weight of the defensive<br />
concentrations laid on from Elsenborn<br />
ridge must also be accounted one of<br />
the main re<strong>as</strong>ons the American infan-<br />
try were not completely overrun during<br />
the night <strong>as</strong>saults of the 17th and<br />
18th. One battalion of the 2d Division<br />
artillery (the 38th Field Artillery (fired<br />
more than 5,000 rounds on the 18th.<br />
But men counted <strong>as</strong> much <strong>as</strong> weight of<br />
metal. <strong>Of</strong> the 48 forward observers<br />
working with the 15th Field Artillery<br />
Battalion, 32 were evacuated for wounds<br />
or exposure in six days of battle.<br />
Although an experienced outfit, the<br />
2d Infantry Division made its first fight<br />
against a large force of tanks in the ac-<br />
tion at Krinkelt-Rocherath. In the early<br />
evening of 18 December General Rob-<br />
ertson telephoned his <strong>as</strong>sistant division<br />
commander: “This is a tank battle–if<br />
t<strong>here</strong> are any tank replacements we<br />
could use them <strong>as</strong> crews are pretty tired.<br />
We could use the tanks mounting a<br />
90-mm. [gun].” Robertson’s wish for an<br />
American tank with adequate armament<br />
to cope with the German Panthers and<br />
Tigers w<strong>as</strong> being echoed and would be<br />
echoed—prayerfully and profanely—<br />
w<strong>here</strong>ver the enemy panzer divisions ap-<br />
peared out of the Ardennes hills and<br />
forests. What the 2d Division actually<br />
had w<strong>as</strong> a little less than a battalion of<br />
Sherman tanks mounting the standard<br />
75-mm. gun, a tank weapon already<br />
proven unequal to a duel with Panther<br />
or Tiger in head-to-head encounter. It<br />
must be said, however, that the 2d Divi-<br />
sion tank support came from a se<strong>as</strong>oned<br />
armored outfit–the 741st Tank Battal-<br />
ion-which had landed at OMAHA<br />
Beach on 6 June and had been almost<br />
constantly in action since. Unable to en-<br />
gage the 12th SS Panthers and the GHQ<br />
Tigers on equal terms in the open field,<br />
the Shermans were parceled out in and<br />
around the villages in two’s and three’s.<br />
Hidden by walls, houses, and hedgerows,<br />
or making sudden forays into the open,<br />
the American tankers stalked the heav-<br />
ier, better armed panzers, maneuvering<br />
under cover for a clear shot at flank or<br />
tail, or lying quietly in a lane until a Pan-<br />
ther or Tiger crossed the sights.<br />
Since most of the enemy tanks entered<br />
the villages in the dark or in the fog,<br />
the defenders generally fought on dis-<br />
tinctly advantageous terms and at ranges<br />
w<strong>here</strong>–if the heavy frontal protection of<br />
the German tank could be avoided–a kill<br />
w<strong>as</strong> certain. The 741st knocked out an<br />
estimated 27 tanks (nearly all of which<br />
actually were examined) and lost 11<br />
Shermans. 9 Even disabled tanks, immo-<br />
bilized inside the American lines, contin-<br />
ued to have a hand in the fight. Two<br />
crippled Shermans parked in a Roche-<br />
rath lane accounted for five Tigers which<br />
incautiously came by broadside. On the<br />
second night the German tanks entered<br />
the villages prepared to ferret out the<br />
American armor. Each <strong>as</strong>sault tank w<strong>as</strong><br />
accompanied by foot soldiers armed with<br />
9 The unit w<strong>as</strong> awarded a Presidential Citation.
126 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
bazook<strong>as</strong>, fires were started to light dark<br />
streets and alleys, and many of the Ger-<br />
mans boldly used their searchlights.<br />
These tactics failed; illumination served<br />
the waiting American tanks <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong><br />
the enemy. German bazooka teams did<br />
succeed in knocking out a pair of Sher-<br />
mans but generally found the American<br />
infantry, dismounted tankers, and tank<br />
destroyer crewmen, waiting to er<strong>as</strong>e the<br />
walking infantry screens.<br />
The American tank destroyers shared<br />
honors with the tanks in this battle, but<br />
<strong>as</strong> it often happened in the Ardennes<br />
the fight had to be carried by the self-<br />
propelled guns, the towed guns serving<br />
mostly <strong>as</strong> convenient targets for the<br />
enemy. The 644th Tank Destroyer Bat-<br />
talion (minus one company) employed<br />
its self-propelled 3-inch guns with such<br />
effect <strong>as</strong> to destroy 17 tanks, disable 3,<br />
and knock out 2 German <strong>as</strong>sault guns.<br />
Two guns of the battalion were damaged<br />
beyond recovery. Most of these kills were<br />
made in or near the villages against<br />
enemy tanks which had halted and were<br />
not firing, at ranges from 25 to 1,000<br />
yards. In some instances one round of<br />
high-velocity, armor-piercing ammuni-<br />
tion w<strong>as</strong> sufficient to set a Panther<br />
aflame; generally two or three rounds<br />
with b<strong>as</strong>e detonating fuzes were needed<br />
and, <strong>as</strong> the Sherman tanks had found,<br />
direct hits on the German frontal armor<br />
or mantlet had the unple<strong>as</strong>ant habit of<br />
glancing off.<br />
The experience of the 801st Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion, a towed outfit, w<strong>as</strong><br />
markedly different. Emplaced close to<br />
the infantry line, its 3-inch guns were<br />
brought under intense shelling and<br />
could be moved only at night. During<br />
attack, bogged in mud and unable to<br />
shift firing positions, the towed tank<br />
destroyers quickly fell prey to direct<br />
fire or infantry <strong>as</strong>sault. Between 17 and<br />
19 December the 801st lost 17 guns<br />
and 16 half-tracks. Indeed, the greatest<br />
combat value of the towed battalion<br />
came from the mines carried on the<br />
half-tracks (which were used with effect<br />
by adjacent riflemen) and the employ-<br />
ment of the gun crews <strong>as</strong> infantry. On<br />
the afternoon of 18 December, with<br />
guns and vehicles gone, the bulk of the<br />
battalion w<strong>as</strong> ordered to Elsenborn.<br />
Even so t<strong>here</strong> were a few instances when<br />
the towed guns were able to fight and<br />
make kills under favorable circum-<br />
stances. One gun from the 801st had<br />
been placed to cover a straggler line<br />
in the vicinity of Hünningen and <strong>here</strong>,<br />
deep inside the American position, sur-<br />
prised and knocked out four Mark IV’s<br />
before it w<strong>as</strong> destroyed.<br />
The infantry antitank weapons em-<br />
ployed in the defense of Krinkelt-Roch-<br />
erath varied considerably in effectiveness.<br />
The 57-mm. battalion antitank guns-<br />
and their crews–simply were tank fod-<br />
der. The mobility of this towed piece,<br />
which had been a feature of the gun on<br />
design boards and in proving ground<br />
tests, failed in the mud at the forward<br />
positions. Only a very lucky shot could<br />
damage a Panther or Tiger, and at the<br />
close of this operation both the 2d and<br />
99th Divisions recommended the aboli-<br />
tion of the 57-mm. <strong>as</strong> an infantry anti-<br />
tank gun. The rifle battalions which<br />
were hurried south from Wahlerscheid<br />
on 17 December had left their mines<br />
in the forest or with the battalion<br />
trains. Even the few antitank mines<br />
on hand could not be put to proper<br />
use during the first night engagement<br />
when stragglers and vehicular columns<br />
were pouring along the same routes the
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 127<br />
WRECKED GERMAN TANK SHOWING “BAZOOKA PANTS,” a defense against rockets.<br />
enemy armor w<strong>as</strong> using. In the first con-<br />
tact at the crossroads e<strong>as</strong>t of Rocherath<br />
the German tanks were halted by a h<strong>as</strong>ty<br />
mine field, but the rifle company made<br />
its most effective use of this defense by<br />
laying mines to protect the rear of the<br />
American position after the tanks had<br />
rolled by. The bazooka in the hands of<br />
the defending infantry proved extremely<br />
useful. During the dark hours, bazooka<br />
teams were able to work close to their<br />
prey under the cover provided by walls,<br />
houses, and hedgerows. But, <strong>as</strong> in the c<strong>as</strong>e<br />
of the tank destroyers, most hits were<br />
scored against tanks which had paused or<br />
been stranded by the detonation of<br />
mines and high-explosive shellfire. In<br />
the various melees at the villages the<br />
German tank crews seldom escaped no<br />
matter what weapon w<strong>as</strong> used against<br />
them. Most crewmen were burned <strong>as</strong><br />
the tank blew up or they were cut down<br />
by bullet fire at close range. The 2d<br />
Division, like most veteran divisions,<br />
had armed itself beyond the limits of<br />
approved tables of equipment. Nearly<br />
every rifle platoon, <strong>as</strong> a result, had at<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t two bazook<strong>as</strong>, so that team play<br />
to distract and then destroy the target<br />
tank w<strong>as</strong> fe<strong>as</strong>ible.<br />
Although fought mostly <strong>as</strong> a series of<br />
close quarter actions, the infantry bat-
128 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tle in this sector saw little American<br />
use of the bayonet. Small arms and light<br />
machine guns took over w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
friendly artillery left off, followed by<br />
grenades and rifle butts when the en-<br />
emy closed. The problem of illuminat-<br />
ing the scene of battle w<strong>as</strong> partially<br />
solved by burning buildings and tanks.<br />
Illuminating shells fired by the 60-mm.<br />
mortars had some local usefulness, but<br />
the precise co-ordination between in-<br />
fantry and artillery required for the<br />
effective use of star shell never w<strong>as</strong><br />
achieved in this battle.<br />
On 19 December German General<br />
Staff officers from the high headquarters<br />
of WFSt and OB WEST appeared in<br />
the battle zone to peer over the shoulders<br />
of the combat commanders and diagnose<br />
the irritating failure to achieve a com-<br />
plete breakthrough. The conclusions<br />
they reported (which obviously took<br />
no official account of stubborn Ameri-<br />
can resistance) were <strong>as</strong> follows. The<br />
check sustained in this sector could not<br />
be attributed to intervention by Allied<br />
air, an interesting reflection of the im-<br />
portance which Allied air-ground co-<br />
operation had <strong>as</strong>sumed in German<br />
tactical thought by the end of 1944. The<br />
road net opened by the advance on 16<br />
December had not been put in good re-<br />
pair. This the observers attributed to a<br />
breakdown of the para-military <strong>To</strong>dt Or-<br />
ganization, whose labor groups were<br />
charged with the mission. Since the<br />
whole concept of the <strong>To</strong>dt Organiza-<br />
tion reached high into the realm of Nazi<br />
politics and personalities, this open<br />
animadversion is surprising and un-<br />
doubtedly caused some consternation.<br />
The chief source of failure, said the Gen-<br />
eral Staff observers, w<strong>as</strong> the inadequate<br />
training of the troops who had been<br />
used in the attack. The conclusion<br />
reached <strong>as</strong> to the future conduct of op-<br />
erations on the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
front w<strong>as</strong> simple enough and in ac-<br />
cordance with established German doc-<br />
trine: more maneuver room must be se-<br />
cured so that the attack could “unfold”;<br />
the entire Elsenborn area, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
must be won and at once. The right<br />
wing must be brought abre<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
1st SS Panzer Division, at this moment<br />
twenty miles to the west of Stoumont.<br />
This new plan, probably only a reflec-<br />
tion of conclusions already reached in<br />
the higher echelons, actually had gone<br />
into effect on 19 December when Ger-<br />
man tanks and infantry made the first<br />
serious attempt to drive northwest from<br />
Büllingen, shoulder the Americans out<br />
of the Butgenbach position, and open<br />
the Büllingen-Malmédy highway.<br />
The Enemy Tries the Western Flank<br />
19–23 December<br />
In Butgenbach, forty-five hundred<br />
yards straight west of the 2d Division<br />
anchor point at Wirtzfeld, the 26th In-<br />
fantry of the 1st Division covered the 2d<br />
Division’s flank and rear. The area be-<br />
tween the two villages w<strong>as</strong> neutralized,<br />
insofar <strong>as</strong> any enemy operation w<strong>as</strong> con-<br />
cerned, by a large lake and a series of<br />
streams. <strong>To</strong> build a defense in depth<br />
along the Büllingen-Butgenbach section<br />
of the Malmédy road and secure a<br />
place on high ground, the 2d Battalion<br />
had pushed forward to a ridge near<br />
Dom Butgenbach, a hamlet <strong>as</strong>tride the<br />
highway. When the enemy failed to<br />
follow up his earlier sorties from Bül-<br />
lingen, American patrols scouted on<br />
the 18th in the direction of that village
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 129<br />
and established that it still belonged to<br />
the Germans.<br />
The 26th Infantry held a none too fav-<br />
orable position. It w<strong>as</strong> separated from its<br />
own division and could expect little help<br />
from the 99th, under which it had occu-<br />
pied Butgenbach, or from the 2d<br />
Division. Isolated action <strong>as</strong> a regimental<br />
combat team, however, w<strong>as</strong> not unknown<br />
in the regiment’s history for it had been<br />
so committed in North Africa during the<br />
K<strong>as</strong>serine fight and at Barrafranca in<br />
Sicily. Although the lake reservoir gave<br />
some protection on the left flank the<br />
position held by the forward battalion,<br />
the 2d, protruded beyond this cover.<br />
The regimental right flank w<strong>as</strong> bare-<br />
at le<strong>as</strong>t no infantry had been brought<br />
in to solidify this section of the line-<br />
and in theory the 26th Infantry w<strong>as</strong><br />
responsible for the defense of the four<br />
miles to the west between Butgenbach<br />
and the town of Weismes.<br />
Colonel Daniel’s 2d Battalion, sticking<br />
out like a sore thumb ahead of the rest<br />
of the regiment, had arrived from the<br />
north in a depleted state, a condition en-<br />
demic throughout the 26th <strong>as</strong> a result of<br />
the very heavy losses sustained during the<br />
1st Division attack toward the Roer<br />
River early in December. T<strong>here</strong>, on<br />
the fringe of the Hürtgen Forest, Com-<br />
panies E and F had been virtually<br />
annihilated, Company G shattered. Now<br />
the 2d Battalion rifle companies were<br />
nine-tenths replacements and num-<br />
bered not more than a hundred men<br />
apiece. All told t<strong>here</strong> were only seven<br />
officers in the battalion who had been<br />
on the roster at the beginning of<br />
December. Two of the heavy ma-<br />
chine gun platoons were manned by<br />
inexperienced gunners. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
shortage of BAR’S and grenade<br />
launchers. Fortunately, however, the 2d<br />
Battalion had been given ample time to<br />
prepare for defense. The rifle platoons<br />
had dug deep, covering the holes with<br />
logs and sandbags; wire w<strong>as</strong> in to the<br />
33d Field Artillery Battalion, em-placed<br />
to give support; and the artillery observ-<br />
ers were dug in well forward.<br />
During the night of 18–19 December<br />
the I SS Panzer Corps gat<strong>here</strong>d in Büllin-<br />
gen the advance striking force designed<br />
for the attack against Butgenbach. It<br />
appears too that the forward command<br />
post of the 12th SS Panzer Division<br />
opened in Büllingen to direct the coming<br />
fight. At le<strong>as</strong>t one battalion of the 25th<br />
SS Panzer Grenadier Regiment had<br />
arrived, plus a few tanks. The bulk of the<br />
division kampfgruppe which had fought<br />
at the twin villages w<strong>as</strong> coming up by<br />
way of Losheimergraben. The tanks had<br />
an especially hard time on the road,<br />
which had been reduced to a river of<br />
mud (German officers later reported<br />
tanks along the route which had churned<br />
down nearly to their decks) . In addition<br />
to the advance detachment and recon-<br />
naissance units of the 12th SS Panzer Di-<br />
vision, the Büllingen force w<strong>as</strong> swelled<br />
during the night by the 27th Fuesilier<br />
Regiment and 12th Fuesilier Battalion,<br />
both of the 12th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion, but the ranks of the latter units had<br />
been severely reduced during the fight<br />
for Losheimergraben.<br />
About 0225 on the 19th some twenty<br />
truckloads of German infantry dismount-<br />
ed just west of Büllingen, deployed be-<br />
hind a dozen tanks, and moved against<br />
the 2d Battalion. The 33d Field Artillery<br />
Battalion opened up at once with illu-<br />
minating shell, then poured in white<br />
phosphorus and high explosive. Some of<br />
the enemy tanks mired down before they
130 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
could reach the American line; others<br />
were discouraged by bazooka and battal-<br />
ion antitank gunfire. Three tanks, how-<br />
ever, kept on along the road leading into<br />
Dom Butgenbach until the 155-mm.<br />
howitzers of the 5th Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talion began to lob HE uncomfortably<br />
close. Possibly crippled by concussion,<br />
the tanks were abandoned but the crews<br />
got away.<br />
The next German attack, at 1010, con-<br />
sisted of attempts in company strength to<br />
find weak points in the 1,800-yard line<br />
occupied by the 2d Battalion. One of<br />
these, against Company G, w<strong>as</strong> broken<br />
up by shells fired in by four battalions of<br />
field artillery. A Panther and an armored<br />
scout car got through. Then a 57-mm.<br />
antitank gun crew crippled both, but the<br />
scout car got off one round that killed the<br />
crew, Cpl. Hale Williams and Pvt. Rich-<br />
ard Wollenberg. However, the armored<br />
threat w<strong>as</strong> ended at this point. On the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t flank two of the battalion’s antitank<br />
guns got the two leading tanks, and ma-<br />
chine gun and mortar fire drove off the<br />
accompanying infantry. This action<br />
ended the first German attempt at crack-<br />
ing the Butgenbach block. The next<br />
would wait upon the <strong>as</strong>sembly of the<br />
troops and vehicles slowly gathering at<br />
Büllingen, w<strong>here</strong> the II SS Panzer Corps<br />
had taken over direction of the battle.<br />
On 18 and 19 December the 3d Para-<br />
chute Division, which had been follow-<br />
ing in the wake of the 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division westward, began to concentrate<br />
south of Weismes. It may be that the 3d<br />
Parachute Division thus far had received<br />
no orders <strong>as</strong> to the projected widening<br />
of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> corridor of ad-<br />
vance and w<strong>as</strong> content with holding a<br />
blocking position along the German<br />
flank <strong>as</strong> originally planned. As it w<strong>as</strong>,<br />
American reinforcements arrived in the<br />
Weismes area on 19 December before the<br />
enemy struck.<br />
The 16th Infantry (Col. Frederick W.<br />
Gibb) w<strong>as</strong> the second regimental combat<br />
team of the 1st Division to take its place<br />
in the barrier being erected on the north-<br />
ern shoulder of the expanding German<br />
salient. The 2d Battalion, leading the<br />
south-moving column, w<strong>as</strong> well set in<br />
Weismes when, in the late afternoon of<br />
19 December, the 3d Parachute Division<br />
commenced desultory jabs at the village.<br />
At the same time the balance of the 16th<br />
Infantry detrucked and swelled out the<br />
Weismes front, making contact to the<br />
west with troops of the veteran 30th In-<br />
fantry Division which had just come into<br />
the Malmédy sector. By the evening of<br />
19 December, then, the 1st Infantry Di-<br />
vision had neighbors on either flank and<br />
its 26th Infantry, although still out in<br />
front, could concentrate on the enemy<br />
force building up at Büllingen.<br />
During the night of 19–20 December<br />
the advance kampfgruppe of the 12th<br />
SS Panzer Division and the bulk of one<br />
regiment from the 12th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division completed their <strong>as</strong>sembly.<br />
About 0600 twenty German tanks and a<br />
rifle battalion converged on Dom But-<br />
genbach in the early morning fog and<br />
mist from south and e<strong>as</strong>t. The front lit<br />
up <strong>as</strong> the American mortars and artil-<br />
lery shot illuminating shell over the<br />
roads leading to the village. Concen-<br />
tration after concentration then plunged<br />
down, three battalions of field artillery<br />
and a 90-mm. battery of antiaircraft<br />
artillery firing <strong>as</strong> f<strong>as</strong>t <strong>as</strong> the pieces<br />
could be worked. The enemy infantry,<br />
punished by this fire and the stream<br />
of bullets from the American foxhole<br />
line, wavered but a handful of tanks
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 131<br />
rolled off the roads and into Dom<br />
Butgenbach. (They had shot down three<br />
bazooka teams and a Company H ma-<br />
chine gun section.) Here, in the dark,<br />
battalion antitank guns placed to defend<br />
the 2d Battalion command post went to<br />
work firing point-blank at the exhaust<br />
fl<strong>as</strong>hes <strong>as</strong> the German vehicles p<strong>as</strong>sed.<br />
Two enemy tanks were holed and the<br />
rest fled the village, although the anti-<br />
tank gun crews suffered at the hands of<br />
the German bazooka teams that had fil-<br />
tered in with the tanks.<br />
A second try came just before dawn,<br />
this time straight down the road from<br />
Büllingen. Ten German tanks in single<br />
file were sighted <strong>as</strong> they came over a<br />
slight ridge to the front of Company F.<br />
Two tank destroyers and three antitank<br />
guns drove the tanks off or at le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
caused them to turn west in search of a<br />
weaker spot in the 2d Battalion defenses.<br />
In the next thrust a platoon of Company<br />
G w<strong>as</strong> badly cut up before friendly artil-<br />
lery finally checked the attack. Fifteen<br />
minutes later, apparently still seeking a<br />
hole, the Germans hit Company E, next<br />
in line to the west. The 60-mm. mortars<br />
illuminated the ground in front of the<br />
company at just the right moment and<br />
two of three tanks heading the <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
were knocked out by bazooka and 57-<br />
mm. fire from the flank. The third tank<br />
commander stuck his head out of the<br />
escape hatch to take a look around and<br />
w<strong>as</strong> promptly pistoled by an American<br />
corporal. 10 By this time shellfire had scat-<br />
tered the German infantry. Nor did the<br />
10 This w<strong>as</strong> Cpl. Henry F. Warner, one of the<br />
57-mm. antitank gunners. He fought the Ger-<br />
man tanks for two days, often by himself, and<br />
destroyed three panzers, but finally w<strong>as</strong> killed<br />
by a machine gun burst from one of the panzers<br />
he w<strong>as</strong> stalking. Warner w<strong>as</strong> awarded the Medal<br />
of Honor.<br />
enemy make another try until dusk, and<br />
then only with combat patrols.<br />
The hardest blows dealt the 2d Bat-<br />
talion defenders at Dom Butgenbach<br />
came on 21 December. After repeated<br />
ple<strong>as</strong> from the 12th SS Panzer the guns<br />
and Werfers which had been used at<br />
Krinkelt-Rocherath were committed, and<br />
the entire 25th Panzer Grenadier Regi-<br />
ment w<strong>as</strong> also made available, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong><br />
one battalion or more of the 12th SS<br />
Panzer Regiment. About three hours be-<br />
fore dawn guns, mortars, tanks, and<br />
Werfers began pounding the American<br />
foxhole line, which w<strong>as</strong> outlined by a<br />
double row of trees, and the few houses<br />
in Dom Butgenbach. This fire continued<br />
unremittingly until the first light in the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, inflicting many c<strong>as</strong>ualties, destroy-<br />
ing weapons by direct hits, and tearing<br />
large gaps in the main line of resistance.<br />
American counterbattery fire w<strong>as</strong> intense<br />
but failed to still the enemy shelling.<br />
Now, <strong>as</strong> the Germans crossed the fields<br />
in <strong>as</strong>sault formation, the American for-<br />
ward observers called for a defensive bar-<br />
rage to box their own front lines. At<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t ten field artillery battalions ulti-<br />
mately joined the fight (for this batteries<br />
of the 2d and 99th Divisions were tied<br />
into the 1st Division fire control system)<br />
and succeeded in discouraging the Ger-<br />
man infantry.<br />
Some panzers and <strong>as</strong>sault guns did<br />
make their way through the storm of ex-<br />
ploding shells and against the 2d Battal-<br />
ion right. During the previous night two<br />
platoons of the regimental antitank com-<br />
pany had taken station <strong>here</strong> right on the<br />
foxhole line and surprised the panzers<br />
with fire at no more than 100 yards.<br />
Two or three kills were inflicted by the<br />
1st Platoon, but other tanks quickly shot<br />
down the 57-mm. crews and then over-
132 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
ran the guns of the 2d Platoon. 11 At this<br />
segment of the 2d Battalion main line of<br />
resistance the foxhole line followed a<br />
long hedgerow. Having broken through<br />
and destroyed the American antitank<br />
guns, the German tankers drove along<br />
the hedgerows searching out the auto-<br />
matic weapons which earlier had helped<br />
check the infantry <strong>as</strong>sault. Undefended<br />
against moving steel, the BAR and ma-<br />
chine gun crews were wiped out.<br />
Through this gaping hole on the 2d<br />
Battalion right more tanks appeared <strong>as</strong><br />
the morning progressed and moved down<br />
the slope toward Dom Butgenbach. A<br />
self-propelled tank destroyer belonging<br />
to the 634th Tank Destroyer Battalion<br />
accounted for seven tanks in succession<br />
<strong>as</strong> these, in column, hove in sight over<br />
the ridge line. Two Sherman tanks, ly-<br />
ing close to a barn, got two of the Ger-<br />
mans before they, in turn, were knocked<br />
out. Three of the enemy reached the<br />
cluster of buildings and fired point-<br />
blank into the houses and barns Colo-<br />
nel Daniel and the 2d Battalion com-<br />
mand post group were defending. Every<br />
device w<strong>as</strong> used to reach the tanks but<br />
with no success until, finding it warm,<br />
two made a break for the open and<br />
were stopped by a section of 90-mm.<br />
tank destroyers which had just come<br />
up. The l<strong>as</strong>t tank w<strong>as</strong> flushed out<br />
from behind a barn by 91-mm. mortar<br />
fire but got away.<br />
The battalion mortars had played an<br />
important role all along the line (one<br />
section firing 750 rounds before its posi-<br />
tion w<strong>as</strong> bl<strong>as</strong>ted by close-range tank fire) ,<br />
and so had every American weapon that<br />
could be brought to bear. But in late<br />
afternoon, when the German <strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong><br />
11 Sgt. I. R. Schwartz received the DSC for gal-<br />
lantry in this action,<br />
dwindling, the 2d Battalion commander<br />
paid the infantryman’s heartfelt compli-<br />
ment to the guns. “The artillery did a<br />
great job. I don’t know w<strong>here</strong> they got<br />
the ammo or when they took time out to<br />
flush the guns but we wouldn’t be <strong>here</strong><br />
now if it w<strong>as</strong>n’t for them. . . . A hun-<br />
dred [Germans] . . . came at one platoon<br />
and not one of them got through.” 12<br />
The regimental cannon company, the 1st<br />
Division Artillery, the 406th Field Artil-<br />
lery Group, and reinforcing batteries<br />
from the 2d and 99th Divisions fired over<br />
ten thousand rounds in support of the<br />
Dom Butgenbach defenders during an<br />
eight-hour shoot on the 21st, pl<strong>as</strong>tering<br />
enemy <strong>as</strong>sembly are<strong>as</strong> and the road net<br />
and plowing up the fields across which<br />
the German attack came. For one period<br />
of three hours all communication between<br />
the hard-pressed rifle battalion<br />
and the artillery broke under German<br />
fire, but the American shells continued<br />
to arrive with dev<strong>as</strong>tating effect. A patrol<br />
sent into the woods from which had come<br />
the final <strong>as</strong>sault against the riddled battalion<br />
flank reported a count of three<br />
hundred dead enemy infantry-the re<strong>as</strong>on,<br />
perhaps, why the tanks that penetrated<br />
to the 2d Battalion command post<br />
came alone. At any rate the 12th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division had had enough.<br />
The division commander told his superiors<br />
that no more attacks could be made<br />
unless a promised <strong>as</strong>sault gun battalion<br />
arrived to ramrod the infantry. The total<br />
German c<strong>as</strong>ualty list must have been<br />
high, and after these three days of battle<br />
heavy inroads had been made in the tank<br />
strength of the 12th SS Panzer Regiment.<br />
The 2d Battalion, understrength<br />
12 Colonel Daniel himself received the DSC.
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 133<br />
when it arrived to face the Germans, had<br />
been reduced by perhaps one quarter.<br />
Indeed, in midafternoon of the 21st, the<br />
battalion commander had planned with-<br />
drawing a thousand yards to the rear to<br />
compensate for the dwindling strength in<br />
the firing line. But when the 2d reorgan-<br />
ized that evening its position w<strong>as</strong> some-<br />
what strengthened. Company C, with<br />
extra bazook<strong>as</strong>, had come up to man the<br />
denuded right flank, the 1st Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion laid a h<strong>as</strong>ty field of<br />
about a thousand mines in front of the<br />
lines, and the regiment had attached the<br />
4.2-inch mortars of the 2d Division<br />
chemical battalion to Daniel’s com-<br />
mand.<br />
Meanwhile the enemy regrouped to<br />
continue the attack with new forces. The<br />
armored infantry reserve of the 12th SS<br />
Panzer Division, the 26th Panzer Grena-<br />
dier Regiment, finally had negotiated the<br />
poor roads and traffic jams along the Ger-<br />
man line of communications and arrived<br />
in Büllingen, ready for its first commit-<br />
ment in the offensive. Shortly after day<br />
broke on 22 December patrols from the<br />
26th commenced to probe at the 2d Bat-<br />
talion lines. The fresh enemy regiment,<br />
however, set out to vary the unsuccessful<br />
headlong tactics previously employed by<br />
striking at the flanks of the Dom Butgen-<br />
bach position. The first <strong>as</strong>sault, shortly<br />
before 1000, carried an undetermined<br />
number of panzer grenadiers through a<br />
gap between Companies A and K, on the<br />
right of the 2d Battalion. Here t<strong>here</strong><br />
were about twenty Mark V’s and tank<br />
destroyers, but the 90-mm. tank de-<br />
stroyers from the 613th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion rushed in on the flank and<br />
stopped the enemy. The continued<br />
threat, though serious, w<strong>as</strong> countered<br />
by shifting local reserves from the<br />
18th and 26th to close the gap, and by<br />
the end of the day the situation w<strong>as</strong> well<br />
in hand. Again the American gunners<br />
had taken over a large share of the<br />
burden, firing over 300 missions. The<br />
co-operation between the artillery and<br />
infantry arms, it must be said, w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
ciprocal. The fact that the 26th Infantry<br />
had continued to hold its position on<br />
ground overlooking the German routes<br />
west had allowed the observers a grand-<br />
stand seat and had caused the German<br />
columns taking the 1st SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sion detour through Schoppen to run a<br />
gantlet of accurate and continuous fire.<br />
The successful withdrawal from the<br />
Krinkelt-Rocherath sector to the more<br />
favorable terrain of the Elsenborn ridge<br />
had resulted, by 20 December, in a fairly<br />
homogeneous and well-constructed de-<br />
fense with the 2d Division on the right<br />
and the 99th Division on the left. On the<br />
morning of this same day the 9th Infan-<br />
try Division took over the Monschau-<br />
Höfen sector (its 47th Infantry had<br />
moved earlier into supporting position<br />
west of these two towns) and so covered<br />
the northern flank of the 99th.<br />
The German attempt to crack the<br />
newly formed north-south line w<strong>as</strong> han-<br />
dled in catch-<strong>as</strong>-catch-can and piecemeal<br />
f<strong>as</strong>hion, for the primary mission w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
flanking maneuver in the Butgenbach<br />
area. The 3d Panzer Grenadier Division,<br />
which had relieved the 12th SS Panzer<br />
Division at the twin villages, went to<br />
work at once against the 99th Division<br />
portion of the Elsenborn line although<br />
the bulk of its rifle strength w<strong>as</strong> not yet<br />
in hand. On the morning of 20 Decem-<br />
ber German tanks and infantry made<br />
the first of three <strong>as</strong>saults. But the 99th,<br />
on a forward slope with perfect visibility<br />
and good fields of fire, checked this and
134 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the subsequent attempts with heavy<br />
losses to the attacker. On the following<br />
day, the 3d Panzer Grenadier w<strong>as</strong> caught<br />
by artillery fire just <strong>as</strong> its <strong>as</strong>sault waves<br />
were forming. Confused and disorgan-<br />
ized, the German infantry were unable<br />
to make another bid.<br />
Farther north, on 22 December, the<br />
277th Volks Grenadier Division returned<br />
to the fray after licking the wounds it<br />
had suffered at Krinkelt-Rocherath and<br />
adding some companies of the 29th Pan-<br />
zer Grenadier Regiment (3d Panzer<br />
Grenadier Division). Early in the morn-<br />
ing two companies from the 277th made<br />
a sharp attack to gain the high ground<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Kalterherberg occupied by the<br />
99th Reconnaissance Troop. No friendly<br />
artillery w<strong>as</strong> ranged in and the German<br />
infantry marched through a mine field,<br />
crossed a stream under direct bullet fire,<br />
and drove through the extended cavalry<br />
line. Two of the cavalry platoons were<br />
encircled and the attack carried for a<br />
thousand yards before Company E of the<br />
47th Infantry and the remaining troop-<br />
ers were able to halt it. Apparently<br />
intent on driving <strong>as</strong> deeply to the Amer-<br />
ican rear <strong>as</strong> possible, the grenadiers gave<br />
the encircled platoons a breathing spell<br />
and with nightfall the Americans suc-<br />
ceeded in escaping. The fight spread to<br />
the 39th Infantry during the afternoon<br />
when small groups of the enemy began<br />
to infiltrate. Reinforcements brought<br />
forward under a smoke screen nourished<br />
the German <strong>as</strong>sault, which by nightfall<br />
had won a foothold inside the American<br />
main line of resistance. 13<br />
13 During the German <strong>as</strong>sault Sgt. Peter J. Dales-<br />
sandro of Company E saved his company from<br />
complete rout by a l<strong>as</strong>t-ditch stand with grenades<br />
and an abandoned machine gun. When he could<br />
hold no longer, the sergeant called for a mortar<br />
During the night of 22 December an<br />
artillery bombardment prepared the way<br />
for German infiltration elsew<strong>here</strong> on the<br />
9th Division front. But when day broke<br />
the Americans drove the enemy back<br />
after a series of short fire fights and re-<br />
stored the line in its entirety. The 277th<br />
Yolks Grenadier Division no longer<br />
possessed the strength to make a real<br />
effort against the north wing of the<br />
Elsenborn line. The 326th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division, its northern neighbor,<br />
had given no hand in this fight-not<br />
surprising in view of the punishment<br />
taken at Höfen and Monschau. Both<br />
divisions now fell out of the drive to<br />
widen the way west. The surest signal<br />
of the failure on the right wing of the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> the ignominious<br />
end of the attack in the Butgenbach sec-<br />
tor, On the morning of 23 December the<br />
18th Infantry barred the gap which had<br />
opened the day before on the right of<br />
the 26th Infantry-and the 12th SS Pan-<br />
zer Division threw in the sponge.<br />
Maj. Gen. Leonard T. Gerow's V<br />
Corps now had four infantry divisions,<br />
the 9th, 99th, 2d, and 1st, standing firmly<br />
on well-organized ground from Mon-<br />
schau to Weismes. The barrier so pre-<br />
sented would restrict and straitjacket the<br />
northern shoulder of the German salient,<br />
at this moment still expanding to the<br />
west. The question remained <strong>as</strong> to<br />
whether, at a later date, the Sixth Pan-<br />
zer <strong>Army</strong> would or could shake this<br />
shoulder free. As it stood, the 1st and 9th<br />
Divisions were given time to concentrate<br />
and regroup their h<strong>as</strong>tily committed reg-<br />
iments, while the 2d and 99th set about<br />
the business of acquiring replacements<br />
for lost men and weapons, gaining a<br />
barrage right on his own position. He w<strong>as</strong> awarded<br />
the Medal of Honor.
THE GERMAN NORTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 135<br />
breather after days of savage and costly<br />
conflict. On the enemy side the LXVII<br />
Corps took over control of the line Mon-<br />
schau-Weismes with the 3d Panzer Gren-<br />
adier, 12th Volks Grenadier, 3d Para-<br />
chute, 277th, and 326th. 14<br />
The American troops who had<br />
jammed the right shoulder of the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> knew they had made a fight<br />
of it. They could hardly know that they<br />
had knocked a part of Hitler's personal<br />
operations plan into a cocked hat. The<br />
elite SS panzer formations on which the<br />
14 See below, pp. 579–80.<br />
Fuehrer so relied would continue to play<br />
a major role in the Ardennes counter-<br />
offensive but no longer would be charged<br />
with the main effort; this had p<strong>as</strong>sed on<br />
20 December to Manteuffel and the<br />
Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. 15 And if, <strong>as</strong> Manteuf-<br />
fel later suggested, the Fuehrer wanted<br />
to see an SS and a regular panzer army<br />
competing, it could be said that he had<br />
his answer.<br />
15 This decision w<strong>as</strong> made about noon on the<br />
20th, probably by Model supported by Rundstedt,<br />
but this is not certain. OB WEST KTB, 20 Dec<br />
44.
CHAPTER VII<br />
Breakthrough at the Schnee Eifel<br />
Introductory Note<br />
The story of the 106th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion and the attached 14th Cavalry<br />
Group is tragic. It is also highly contro-<br />
versial. Since the major part of the<br />
division w<strong>as</strong> eliminated from combined<br />
operations with other American forces<br />
on the second day of the German coun-<br />
teroffensive, information from contem-<br />
porary records is scanty and, <strong>as</strong><br />
to particulars, often completely lacking.<br />
The historian, <strong>as</strong> a result, must tread<br />
warily through the maze of recrimina-<br />
tion and highly personalized recollection<br />
which surrounds this story. It should not<br />
be concluded that reminiscence by those<br />
caught up in this dis<strong>as</strong>ter is consciously<br />
tendentious. But the officers and men of<br />
the 106th Division who so narrowly es-<br />
caped the German trap or who spent<br />
months in German prisons would be less<br />
than human if they did not seek to dis-<br />
cover the cause of this debacle in either<br />
human error or frailty. Since the author<br />
h<strong>as</strong> been forced to depend in so great<br />
degree on the human memory, unaided<br />
or unchallenged by the written record,<br />
the scholar’s old rule “one witness, no<br />
witness” h<strong>as</strong> been generally applied.<br />
Even so, some relaxation of the rule is<br />
necessary if a sustained and sequential<br />
narrative is to be presented. Fortunately,<br />
the picture <strong>as</strong> seen from the German side<br />
of the Schnee Eifel is fairly complete<br />
and can be applied <strong>as</strong> a corrective in<br />
most of the major are<strong>as</strong> of controversy<br />
and contradiction. *<br />
* The records and reports of the 106th Division<br />
and the 424th Infantry are intact although rather<br />
scanty in content. The records of the 422d and<br />
423d were destroyed before the capture of these<br />
regiments, but the Historical Division, ETO, did<br />
interview a large number of officers and men from<br />
these regiments when they were rele<strong>as</strong>ed from<br />
German prisons. First <strong>Army</strong> conducted Inspector<br />
General investigations of the actions of the 106th<br />
Division, the 820th Tank Destroyer Battalion, the<br />
106th Reconnaissance Troop, and the 14th Cavalry<br />
Group. Most of the records of the 14th Cavalry<br />
Group were destroyed but the commanding offi-<br />
cer, Col. Mark Devine, provided the author with<br />
some personal papers. The VIII Corps after ac-<br />
tion report and G–2 and G–3 journals are very<br />
useful for the relations between corps and division.<br />
Participants in this battle made special reports<br />
for the Advanced Infantry <strong>Of</strong>ficers Course No. 1<br />
(Maj. William P. Moon, Maj. J. C. Hollinger,<br />
and Capt. Alan W. Jones, Jr.) See also, the 275th<br />
Armored Field Artillery Battalion journal and<br />
S–2 report. Col. R. Ernest Dupuy h<strong>as</strong> written a<br />
very good semiofficial history entitled, St. Vith:<br />
Lion in the Way, the 106th Infantry Division in<br />
World War II (W<strong>as</strong>hington: Infantry Journal<br />
Press, 1949). Dupuy’s work h<strong>as</strong> been heavily<br />
drawn on, but the reader will find several points<br />
at which Dupuy and the present account differ.<br />
The German manuscripts are very detailed and<br />
useful; see particularly MSS # B–026, Effects of<br />
Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive on <strong>Army</strong> Group G (SS Gen-<br />
eraloberst Waffen-SS Paul Hauser); B–688 (incor-<br />
porating B–734), 18th Volks Grenadier Division, 1<br />
September 1944–25 January 1945 (Lt. Col. Dietrich<br />
Moll) ; A–924 (Kraemer); B–333, LXVI Corps,<br />
October–23 December 1944 (General der Artillerie<br />
Walter Lucht) .
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 137<br />
Dispositions of the<br />
106th Infantry Division<br />
From the Eifel plateau protrude three<br />
distinct ridges or ranges, the central be-<br />
ing called the Schnee Eifel. This middle<br />
ridge, so important in the action that<br />
developed in the 106th Division sector,<br />
inclines northe<strong>as</strong>t-southwest. At the west-<br />
ern foot of the Schnee Eifel t<strong>here</strong> runs a<br />
long narrow valley incised in the high<br />
plain, the so-called Losheim Gap. On the<br />
western side of the gap the Our River<br />
meanders along, and beyond the river to<br />
the west the plateau appears once more<br />
in heavily wooded form. The Losheim<br />
Gap is no ple<strong>as</strong>ant, p<strong>as</strong>toral valley but is<br />
cluttered by abrupt hills, some bare,<br />
others covered by fir trees and thick<br />
undergrowth. Most of the little villages<br />
<strong>here</strong> are found in the draws and potholes<br />
which further scoop out the main valley.<br />
The Losheim Gap w<strong>as</strong> occupied on 16<br />
December by a reinforced squadron of<br />
the 14th Cavalry Group. (Map III)<br />
The fate of the 106th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion and the 14th Cavalry Group w<strong>as</strong><br />
bound together on that day by official<br />
orders attaching the cavalry to the infan-<br />
try, by circumstances of terrain, and by<br />
the German plan of attack. <strong>To</strong> the<br />
left of the cavalry group ran the bound-<br />
ary between the VIII Corps and V<br />
Corps, its northern neighbor being the<br />
99th Infantry Division. <strong>To</strong> the right<br />
of the 106th lay the 28th Division, con-<br />
stituting the center of General Middle-<br />
ton's corps. The 106th itself occupied the<br />
central and southern sections of the<br />
heavily forested Schnee Eifel.<br />
American successes some weeks earlier<br />
had driven the enemy from a part of the<br />
West Wall positions along the Schnee<br />
Eifel, creating a salient which jutted<br />
deep into the German lines. Although<br />
such a salient w<strong>as</strong> exposed, the possession<br />
of at le<strong>as</strong>t a wedge in the West Wall<br />
seemed to compensate for the risk in-<br />
volved. It should be noticed that the<br />
Schnee Eifel range is terminated in the<br />
south by a cross corridor, running against<br />
the usual north to south grain of the<br />
Eifel plateau. This is the valley of the<br />
Alf, a small creek which makes a long<br />
horse-shoe bend around the Schnee Eifel<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t to the village of Pronsfeld.<br />
Three main roads run through this<br />
area. From the crossroads village of Hall-<br />
schlag the northernmost descends into<br />
the Our valley, crossing and recrossing<br />
the river until it reaches St. Vith. The<br />
center road, secondary in construction,<br />
traverses the Losheim Gap from Roth<br />
southwestward. The southernmost road<br />
follows the valley of the Alf from Prüm,<br />
but eventually turns through Winter-<br />
spelt toward the northwest and St. Vith.<br />
Thus two main roads, of macadam con-<br />
struction and some twenty-two feet wide,<br />
ran through the American positions<br />
directly to St. Vith. These roads were<br />
characteristic of the e<strong>as</strong>tern Ardennes,<br />
winding, with many blind turns,<br />
squeezing through narrow village streets,<br />
dipping abruptly, and rising suddenly<br />
across the ravines. But each of the roads<br />
to St. Vith circles around the Schnee<br />
Eifel at one of its termini.<br />
The width of the sector held by the<br />
106th Infantry Division and the attached<br />
14th Cavalry Group w<strong>as</strong> approximately<br />
eighteen air-line miles. When traced on<br />
the ground, the line these forces were<br />
responsible for defending w<strong>as</strong> actually<br />
more than twenty-one miles in length.<br />
The 14th Cavalry Group (Col. Mark<br />
Devine) w<strong>as</strong> charged with a 9,000-yard<br />
front in the 106th Division sector along
138 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the line Lanzerath-Krewinkel-Roth-<br />
Kobscheid. This disposition placed the<br />
cavalry to the north of the Schnee Eifel<br />
and across the northe<strong>as</strong>tern entrance to<br />
the Losheim Gap. The section of the<br />
West Wall which barred egress from the<br />
gap lay beyond the cavalry positions.<br />
The dispositions of the 106th Infantry<br />
Division (Maj. Gen. Alan W. Jones)<br />
followed an irregular line which in gen-<br />
eral trended from northe<strong>as</strong>t to southwest.<br />
The 422d Infantry (Col. George L.<br />
Descheneaux, Jr.) occupied the forward<br />
positions of the West Wall on the crest<br />
and western slopes of the midsection of<br />
the Schnee Eifel. This regiment and the<br />
cavalry, t<strong>here</strong>fore, combined <strong>as</strong> defend-<br />
ers of a salient protruding beyond the<br />
neighbors to the north and south. The<br />
line occupied by the 423d Infantry (Col.<br />
Charles C. Cavender) continued briefly<br />
on the Schnee Eifel, then <strong>as</strong> this range<br />
dropped away swung back into the west-<br />
ern portion of the Alf valley. Thence<br />
followed a gap screened by the division<br />
reconnaissance troop. The 424th Infan-<br />
try (Col. Alexander D. Reid) continued<br />
the bend to the west at Grosslangenfeld<br />
and joined the 28th Infantry Division,<br />
at le<strong>as</strong>t by periodic patrols, north of<br />
Lützkampen.<br />
On 19 October the 18th Cavalry Re-<br />
connaissance Squadron had taken over<br />
the positions in the Losheim Gap from<br />
another cavalry squadron attached to the<br />
2d Infantry Division with instructions to<br />
occupy the infantry positions then exist-<br />
ing. The 14th Cavalry Group took over<br />
the sector on 11 December, using the<br />
18th and a company of 3-inch towed<br />
tank destroyers much <strong>as</strong> they had been<br />
deployed.' earlier. The ground occupied<br />
by the cavalry w<strong>as</strong> relatively flat <strong>here</strong> at<br />
the mouth of the gap, although broken<br />
by streams and knotted by hills <strong>as</strong> is<br />
common on the Ardennes plateau. In<br />
contr<strong>as</strong>t to the ridge lines the floor of the<br />
gap had a few trees. The infantry posi-<br />
tions inherited by the cavalry were in<br />
the little villages, most of which had<br />
been built in depressions offering some<br />
protection against the raw winds which<br />
sweep the Ardennes. T<strong>here</strong> were eight<br />
garrison points; a homogeneous defense<br />
line, of course, w<strong>as</strong> out of the question.<br />
In addition, t<strong>here</strong> existed substantial<br />
gaps on both flanks of the cavalry. In<br />
the north the gap between the 14th<br />
Cavalry Group and the 99th Infantry<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> approximately two miles<br />
across. A small party from the attached<br />
tank destroyer outfit (Company A,<br />
820th Tank Destroyer Battalion)<br />
patrolled this opening at two-hour inter-<br />
vals in conjunction with an I and R Pla-<br />
toon from the 99th Division. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
an unoccupied strip between the right<br />
of the cavalry and the left of the 422d In-<br />
fantry about one and a half miles across;<br />
the responsibility for patrolling <strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
given to the infantry.<br />
At best the cavalry positions could only<br />
be described <strong>as</strong> small islands of resist-<br />
ance, manned usually in platoon<br />
strength and depending on automatic<br />
weapons dismounted from the cavalry<br />
vehicles or on the towed 3-inch guns<br />
of the tank destroyer company. Some<br />
barbed wire had been strung around<br />
the garrison villages. Mine fields, both<br />
German and American, were known to<br />
be in the area, but neither the 14th<br />
Cavalry Group nor the 2d Infantry<br />
Division before it could chart their<br />
location. On 14 December Colonel De-<br />
vine had <strong>as</strong>ked corps for engineers and<br />
more mines.<br />
Contrary to the doctrine and training
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 139<br />
of mechanized cavalry, the 14th Cavalry<br />
Group w<strong>as</strong> committed to a positional<br />
defense. Since the cavalry squadron<br />
does not have the staying power for<br />
defense in depth, and since the width of<br />
this front made an interlocking linear<br />
defense impossible, the 14th–if hit hard<br />
–w<strong>as</strong> at best capable only of delaying<br />
action. Lacking the freedom of maneuver<br />
usually accorded cavalry, the 14th Cav-<br />
alry Group would have little hope of<br />
winning time by counterattack. The 32d<br />
Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron, re-<br />
fitting near Vielsalm, Belgium, w<strong>as</strong> avail-<br />
able on short notice to reinforce the rest<br />
of the cavalry group; its officers had<br />
reconnoitered forward positions and<br />
telephone wire had been laid in at a few<br />
points. T<strong>here</strong> seems to have been no<br />
specific plan for the employment of the<br />
32d Squadron. Colonel Devine and his<br />
staff, during the few days available, had<br />
worked out a general defensive plan<br />
giving specific routes of withdrawal and<br />
successive defense lines. Apparently this<br />
plan w<strong>as</strong> finished on the night of 15 De-<br />
cember but w<strong>as</strong> never circulated.<br />
The staff of the cavalry group w<strong>as</strong><br />
evidently familiar with the defensive<br />
plan worked out earlier by the 2d Divi-<br />
sion which, in the Losheim area, called<br />
for an initial withdrawal to the Mander-<br />
feld ridge and an American counter-<br />
attack by forces taken from the Schnee<br />
Eifel. During the brief attachment of the<br />
14th Cavalry Group to the 106th Divi-<br />
sion no comparable plan to support the<br />
forces on the low ground in the gap by<br />
withdrawing troops from the more<br />
readily defended line on the Schnee<br />
Eifel w<strong>as</strong> ever issued, although Colonel<br />
Devine had made several trips to the<br />
106th on this matter. The 2d Division<br />
also had an artillery plan which provided<br />
for approximately 200 prearranged con-<br />
centrations to be fired on call in the gap.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is no evidence that this plan w<strong>as</strong><br />
taken over by the 106th Division artil-<br />
lery (which would have had to shift its<br />
battalions), but the cavalry did have one<br />
battalion of 105-mm. howitzers, the<br />
275th Armored (Lt. Col. Roy Udell<br />
Clay), in support about two and a half<br />
miles west of Manderfeld.<br />
Much of the subsequent story of events<br />
in the Losheim Gap and the Schnee<br />
Eifel turns on the relations between the<br />
106th Division and the 14th Cavalry<br />
Group. The brief span of their acquaint-<br />
ance is t<strong>here</strong>fore pertinent. On 20 Octo-<br />
ber the 106th Division shipped from the<br />
United States. On 11 December it <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sumed its first combat role, taking over<br />
the quiet sector on the left of the VIII<br />
Corps w<strong>here</strong> the veteran 2d Infantry<br />
Division had been resting. The relief<br />
w<strong>as</strong> completed a day later. The 18th<br />
Cavalry Squadron had been in the gap<br />
positions since 19 October, less B Troop<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> deployed on the south flank<br />
of the 2d Division and which remained<br />
in that area when the 106th arrived. Gen-<br />
eral Robertson, the 2d Division com-<br />
mander, had long regarded the single<br />
cavalry squadron <strong>as</strong> insufficient to cover<br />
the Losheim Gap and had centered his<br />
sole divisional reserve, a reinforced in-<br />
fantry battalion, in the vicinity of Auw<br />
so <strong>as</strong> to support either the cavalry or<br />
infantry. Robertson’s recommendations<br />
finally were noticed and on 11 December<br />
the 106th Division had attached to it a<br />
full cavalry reconnaissance group instead<br />
of only the one squadron. But time to<br />
organize the defense of the individual<br />
sectors of the 106th Division, much less<br />
to co-ordinate over-all defensive plans<br />
and preparations, w<strong>as</strong> short.
140 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
The 106th Infantry Division had been<br />
activated in March 1943. Early in 1944<br />
the division took part in the Tennessee<br />
maneuvers, but its training program (<strong>as</strong><br />
in the c<strong>as</strong>e of many new divisions) w<strong>as</strong><br />
more or less vitiated when some 60 per-<br />
cent of the enlisted strength w<strong>as</strong> drained<br />
off to meet the heavy demands for<br />
trained infantry before and after D-day.<br />
When the 106th Division relieved the 2d<br />
Division on 11–12 December, freeing<br />
the latter for use in the proposed V<br />
Corps attack to seize the Roer River<br />
dams, it moved into well-prepared posi-<br />
tions and a fairly quiet front. The<br />
veteran 2d Division had protected its<br />
front-line units against the bitter Ar-<br />
dennes weather with log dugouts for the<br />
rifle and weapon squads. Stoves were in<br />
the squad huts and the kitchen ranges<br />
were up front in covered dugouts. Heavy<br />
weapons were exchanged, the 106th<br />
taking over the .50-caliber machine guns,<br />
mortars, and other weapons w<strong>here</strong> they<br />
had been emplaced in order to conceal<br />
the relief from the enemy. The extensive<br />
communications net prepared by the 2d<br />
Division, with wire to almost every squad<br />
and outpost, w<strong>as</strong> left to the 106th, but<br />
unlike its predecessor the 106th had few<br />
sound-powered telephones.<br />
Before his departure the 2d Division<br />
commander handed over his defensive<br />
scheme and briefed the incoming com-<br />
mander and staff. Because General<br />
Robertson had looked upon the Losheim<br />
Gap <strong>as</strong> particularly sensitive, the 2d Di-<br />
vision defensive and counterattack plans<br />
laid special emph<strong>as</strong>is on support for<br />
troops in that sector. In brief, the 2d<br />
Division planned to pull the forces in<br />
the gap back to the Manderfeld ridge<br />
while the two regimental combat teams<br />
on the Schnee Eifel would withdraw<br />
west to a shortened line along the Auw-<br />
Bleialf ridge road, thus freeing one<br />
combat team for counterattack in the<br />
north. Local counterattack plans pre-<br />
pared by regiments and battalions like-<br />
wise were handed over. From 12 through<br />
15 December the 106th Division com-<br />
mander and staff reconnoitered the new<br />
area; then, after a conference with the<br />
VIII Corps commander, they began<br />
study on detailed recommendations for<br />
a more adequate defense. These were<br />
never completed or submitted although<br />
General Jones did make oral requests to<br />
alter his deployment.<br />
In the circumstances then existing,<br />
adequate me<strong>as</strong>ures to cope with the<br />
problem of such an extended front<br />
would have required one of two things:<br />
substantial reinforcement or withdrawal<br />
to a shorter line. Some five weeks earlier<br />
General Middleton had acted to reduce<br />
the Schnee Eifel salient by withdrawing<br />
the 23d Infantry (2d Division) from its<br />
forward positions in the West Wall. It<br />
w<strong>as</strong> into this new westward sector on the<br />
right flank of the salient that the 424th<br />
Infantry moved–even so, the regiment<br />
took over a front of nearly six miles.<br />
Middleton w<strong>as</strong> under compulsion from<br />
higher headquarters to retain the Schnee<br />
Eifel salient and the existing dispositions<br />
of the two regiments t<strong>here</strong>in. T<strong>here</strong><br />
were plans afoot for an attack toward<br />
Bonn, <strong>as</strong> part of the forthcoming Allied<br />
offensive, and the gap in the West Wall<br />
represented by this salient would be ex-<br />
tremely useful in any sortie against<br />
Bonn.<br />
Besides the 14th Cavalry Group the<br />
106th Division possessed the conven-<br />
tional attached units: a tank destroyer<br />
battalion (the 820th) and an antiair-<br />
craft battalion (the 634th Automatic
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 141<br />
Weapons). In addition to the 275th Ar-<br />
mored Field Artillery Battalion, sup-<br />
porting the cavalry, eight battalions of<br />
corps artillery were in position to rein-<br />
force the 106th Division artillery by fire<br />
when called. 1 These battalions repre-<br />
sented the bulk of the VIII Corps<br />
artillery.<br />
The road net within the division area<br />
and to its front w<strong>as</strong> limited and in poor<br />
condition, but this w<strong>as</strong> an endemic con-<br />
dition in the Ardennes, particularly dur-<br />
ing winter months. The macadam<br />
stretches required constant mending<br />
and the dirt roads quickly sank away<br />
w<strong>here</strong> not shored up with logs and<br />
stone. But though transit by heavy vehic-<br />
ular columns w<strong>as</strong> difficult it w<strong>as</strong> by no<br />
means impossible-<strong>as</strong> the event proved.<br />
Four avenues of penetration were open<br />
to a road-bound enemy. All four would<br />
be used. Following from north to south,<br />
they were: (1) Hallschlag, southwest<br />
through Manderfeld (the 14th Cavalry<br />
Group command post) and Schönberg<br />
(at this point crossing the Our River),<br />
thence to St. Vith; (2) a secondary road<br />
from Roth, west through Auw, then to<br />
Schönberg or Bleialf; (3) Prüm (a large<br />
German communications center) north-<br />
west to Bleialf and on to Schönberg; (4)<br />
Pronsfeld, directly northwest through<br />
Habscheid and Winterspelt to the Our<br />
River bridges at Steinebrück, then on to<br />
St. Vith. These roads, following the<br />
natural channels around and west of the<br />
Schnee Eifel, extend across the Our<br />
River by way of bridges at Andler,<br />
Schönberg, and Steinebrück. St Vith is<br />
the funnel through which the roads<br />
coming from the Our p<strong>as</strong>s to the west.<br />
The degree to which the green 106th<br />
1 These were the 770th 965th, 333d, 771st. 559th,<br />
561st, 578th, and 740th Field Artillery Battalions.<br />
Division had been acclimatized to its new<br />
surroundings by the morning of 16 De-<br />
cember is impossible to determine. The<br />
arduous truck journey across France and<br />
Belgium, through bitter cold and cling-<br />
ing damp, must have been dispiriting to<br />
untried troops. The front-line shelters in<br />
which the veterans of the 2d Infantry<br />
Division had made themselves relatively<br />
comfortable probably did little more<br />
than take the raw edge off the miserable<br />
weather prevalent when the 106th<br />
marched to the bunkers, foxholes, and<br />
dugouts. By 15 December a number of<br />
trench foot c<strong>as</strong>es already had occurred,<br />
particularly in the 422d Infantry, which<br />
had been the l<strong>as</strong>t regiment to draw over-<br />
shoes.<br />
The extent to which the division w<strong>as</strong><br />
armed to defend itself is also a matter<br />
of debate. All units had the normal b<strong>as</strong>ic<br />
load of ammunition on hand, although<br />
t<strong>here</strong> seems to have been a shortage of<br />
carbine and bazooka rounds. The near-<br />
est ammunition supply point w<strong>as</strong> at<br />
Noville, over forty miles southwest of<br />
St. Vith, making resupply slow and diffi-<br />
cult. Jones had requested antitank mines<br />
but these were not delivered in time. A<br />
thin, linear defense such <strong>as</strong> that inherited<br />
in the Schnee Eifel required an extraor-<br />
dinary number of automatic weapons.<br />
Although by this time the veteran ET0<br />
divisions were carrying BAR’S and light<br />
machine guns far in excess of authorized<br />
allowances, the 106th Division possessed<br />
only the regulation number and type of<br />
issue weapons-fewer than were needed<br />
to organize a twenty-one mile front. On<br />
the whole, however, the 106th seems to<br />
have entered the line with a high state<br />
of morale; had it not exchanged the<br />
tedium of training and “show-down” in-<br />
spections for the excitement of an active
142<br />
theater of operations w<strong>here</strong> victory w<strong>as</strong><br />
always the American portion?<br />
Enemy Preparations for Another<br />
Cannae<br />
Late in November 1944 General<br />
Lucht, commander of the LXVI Corps<br />
w<strong>as</strong> called to the headquarters of the<br />
Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. Here Manteuffel<br />
told him of the coming offensive in the<br />
Ardennes and said that his corps would<br />
form the army right wing. The corps’<br />
mission, in brief, would be to byp<strong>as</strong>s the<br />
Schnee Eifel on either side, seize the<br />
road net at St. Vith, and thrust in<br />
columnar formation to and across the<br />
Meuse River. Lucht would be given only<br />
two infantry divisions, one of which, the<br />
18th Volks Grenadier Division, w<strong>as</strong><br />
holding the section of the West Wall<br />
along the northern reaches of the Schnee<br />
Eifel. The second division, unnamed,<br />
would not be designated or available<br />
until shortly before the attack. The<br />
LXVI Corps commander apparently<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not unduly concerned by the lack<br />
of weight allotted; after all, the main<br />
army effort turned on its two panzer<br />
corps. But like all veteran German<br />
field commanders on the Western<br />
Front, Lucht w<strong>as</strong> vitally concerned with<br />
the problem of air support. The first<br />
question he put to Manteuffel phr<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
this concern. Manteuffel parried with<br />
the stock answer: OKW had promised<br />
adequate air support; but in any c<strong>as</strong>e it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> hoped that bad flying weather during<br />
December would dr<strong>as</strong>tically curtail the<br />
enemy effectiveness in the air.<br />
About 1 December the commander of<br />
the 18th Volks Grenadier Division,<br />
Generalmajor Hoffmann-Schönborn, w<strong>as</strong><br />
let in on the closely guarded secret, join-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
ing Lucht and his chief of staff at the<br />
planning table. The Luftwaffe could<br />
furnish no terrain photos, but detailed<br />
maps and terrain appreciations for this<br />
area were on file. The final terrain esti-<br />
mate concluded that the sector north of<br />
the Schnee Eifel offered fewer natural<br />
obstacles than that to the south. Further-<br />
more, the Losheim Gap appeared to have<br />
the weakest defending force. The Our<br />
River w<strong>as</strong> an obstacle, but known cross-<br />
ing sites existed at Andler, Schönberg,<br />
and Steinebrück. St. Vith w<strong>as</strong> nearly<br />
equidistant from the planned attack<br />
positions north or south of the Schnee<br />
Eifel, twelve to fourteen straight-line<br />
miles.<br />
The final plan of maneuver, largely<br />
dictated by Manteuffel, made the 18th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division responsible for<br />
a concentric attack moving north and<br />
south of the Schnee Eifel. The division<br />
would place its strongest kampfgruppe<br />
in the north, however, and make the<br />
main corps effort t<strong>here</strong>. Lucht re<strong>as</strong>oned<br />
that the 18th knew the ground and<br />
would make the quickest progress; but<br />
he also wished to retain close control<br />
over the drive when it reached St. Vith,<br />
and such control could best be exercised<br />
by a single command. Furthermore the<br />
second division would have no time to<br />
learn the ground and, set to make a<br />
single envelopment in the southern part<br />
of the corps sector, would face extensive<br />
field fortifications on broken, wooded<br />
terrain. The fact that Lucht did not ex-<br />
pect the thin American line to his front<br />
to offer strong resistance may be one of<br />
the re<strong>as</strong>ons he risked splitting the 18th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division, rather than<br />
committing one division at each end of<br />
the Schnee Eifel. Since none of the<br />
German planners expected an American
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 143<br />
counterthrust across the Schnee Eifel<br />
range, a very small force from the 18th<br />
Volks Grenadier Replacement Battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> reckoned a sufficient screen on the<br />
heights. The corps lacked a tank battal-<br />
ion and w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed an <strong>as</strong>sault gun<br />
brigade in its place. The corps artillery<br />
w<strong>as</strong> deemed too weak to engage the<br />
Americans in a counterbattery duel at<br />
the outset of the attack, and in addition<br />
the Germans hoped to make early and<br />
deep penetrations by surprise; concerted<br />
artillery preparations prior to H-hour,<br />
then, were ruled out. Neither Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> nor LXVI Corps seems to<br />
have fixed a definite timetable; the 18th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division is said not to<br />
have expected to reach St. Vith earlier<br />
than 18 December.<br />
Both the divisions which subsequently<br />
took part in the Schnee Eifel operation<br />
were newly organized and inexperi-<br />
enced. The 18th had been formed dur-<br />
ing September on the ruins of the 18th<br />
Air Force Field Division, earlier de-<br />
stroyed in the Mons pocket. Recon-<br />
structed from Luftwaffe and Navy units,<br />
plus a strong admixture of Volks-<br />
deutsche and workers drawn in by the<br />
new draft laws, the 18th lacked trained<br />
noncoms and officers. But the unit w<strong>as</strong><br />
more fortunate than many another in<br />
that its occupation of the northern sec-<br />
tor in the Schnee Eifel did not bring on<br />
many losses prior to the counteroffensive<br />
and permitted its troops to be rotated<br />
through training are<strong>as</strong> in the rear.<br />
The division commander seems to<br />
have sold General Lucht on the idea of<br />
making the main thrust toward St. Vith<br />
from north of the Schnee Eifel–although<br />
both were certain that the double en-<br />
velopment envisaged would cut off a very<br />
large American force. The right attack<br />
group w<strong>as</strong> heavily weighted, consisting<br />
of two regiments, most of the division<br />
artillery, and the <strong>as</strong>sault gun brigade. In<br />
reserve, for exploitation of any success<br />
on the right wing, w<strong>as</strong> a mobile battal-<br />
lion, made up of the division tank de-<br />
stroyer battalion, a reconnaissance com-<br />
pany, and an engineer company. The<br />
main breakthrough w<strong>as</strong> to be attempted<br />
in the vicinity of Roth. The left attack<br />
group, one regiment and a battalion of<br />
self-propelled artillery, w<strong>as</strong> directed to<br />
make its penetration through Bleialf,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> the Americans probably would<br />
be encountered in force. Nevertheless,<br />
this kampfgruppe had the mission of<br />
seizing the Schönberg bridge. The divi-<br />
sion replacement battalion, two hun-<br />
dred strong, would be left to man the<br />
division center along the Schnee Eifel.<br />
Early in December the 62d Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, Lucht’s second di-<br />
vision, detrained at Prüm, but did not<br />
go immediately into the forward corps<br />
sector. The 62d bore the number of an<br />
infantry division which had been de-<br />
stroyed on the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front, but it had<br />
been rebuilt from the ground up. Never<br />
before in action, the 62d w<strong>as</strong> commanded<br />
by a general who likewise lacked combat<br />
experience, Generalmajor Frederich<br />
Kittel. The division w<strong>as</strong> at full strength<br />
for its cl<strong>as</strong>s: like the 18th it num-<br />
bered three regiments of two-battalion<br />
strength. Equipment w<strong>as</strong> new and<br />
complete. The mission now handed the<br />
newly arrived division w<strong>as</strong> to effect a<br />
break-through on the left of the 18th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division in the Gross-<br />
langenfeld-Heckhuscheid sector, advance<br />
northwest on a broad front (clearing<br />
the Pronsfeld–St. Vith road), and<br />
seize the Our River crossings at Steine-<br />
brück. The 62d Volks Grenadier Divi-
144 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> to leave to its northern neigh-<br />
bor the t<strong>as</strong>k of capturing St. Vith, but<br />
w<strong>as</strong> expected to block the western and<br />
southern exits.<br />
The LXVI Corps staff w<strong>as</strong> acutely<br />
conscious that the American observation<br />
posts on the Schnee Eifel overlooked the<br />
German positions. Everything possible<br />
w<strong>as</strong> done to avoid exciting American<br />
suspicion or arousing American interest.<br />
All patrolling w<strong>as</strong> banned from 10 De-<br />
cember on, but the arrival of the 106th<br />
Division (which the Germans immedi-<br />
ately spotted <strong>as</strong> new and inexperienced)<br />
led to a limited relaxation of this order.<br />
Patrols working at night about 12 or 13<br />
December did discover something of<br />
interest-but in the 14th Cavalry Group<br />
sector. Here it w<strong>as</strong> found that the two<br />
thousand yards separating Roth and<br />
Weckerath (on the south flank of the<br />
cavalry position) w<strong>as</strong> unoccupied, and<br />
that the two villages were weakly held.<br />
Plans were made at once to exploit this<br />
weak spot-an explanation, perhaps, of<br />
the decision to make the main penetra-<br />
tion by the northern attack group in the<br />
Roth area.<br />
From 5 to 12 December the German<br />
artillery moved forward to carefully<br />
camouflaged positions from which the<br />
attack could be supported. The artillery<br />
regiment of the 18th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division occupied old emplacements in<br />
the West Wall area behind the corps<br />
right flank. Corps artillery formed a<br />
groupment southwest of Prüm to give<br />
general support to the southern attack<br />
group of the 18th and the green 62d.<br />
On the north wing the <strong>as</strong>sault gun bri-<br />
gade would have to move to its attack<br />
positions through the West Wall anti-<br />
tank line. Because demolition might<br />
alert the Americans, underpinning for<br />
inclined ramps w<strong>as</strong> built over the dra-<br />
gon’s teeth during the nights before the<br />
attack. All that remained w<strong>as</strong> to f<strong>as</strong>ten<br />
on the planking (and this job w<strong>as</strong> later<br />
done, the <strong>as</strong>sault guns climbing over<br />
with e<strong>as</strong>e). Meanwhile a special field<br />
artillery observation battalion w<strong>as</strong> at<br />
work, spotting the American gun posi-<br />
tions and reporting minor changes in<br />
the opposing battery alignment. The<br />
LXVI Corps staff, it may be added, were<br />
very much concerned over the artillery<br />
weight known to be available to the<br />
American defenders in the zone of pro-<br />
jected advance.<br />
On the night of 14 December it<br />
seemed for a moment that all the care-<br />
ful precautions the LXVI Corps had<br />
taken to m<strong>as</strong>k its intentions might go<br />
for nought. The 2d Panzer Division<br />
tanks, which had detrained at Stadtkyll,<br />
moved along the roads behind the corps’<br />
left flank en route to the south. Through<br />
the clear, cold air the noise of tracks<br />
and motors could be heard for miles.<br />
But much to General Lucht’s relief no<br />
American reconnaissance planes ap-<br />
peared the following day. Apparently<br />
the secret preparations for attack still<br />
were secret. 2<br />
The 18th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
sector narrowed somewhat on 15 De-<br />
cember when the northern neighbor,<br />
I SS Panzer Corps, extended its left<br />
wing to include Neuhof and Ormont;<br />
the division sector at the commencement<br />
of the attack now would be about ten<br />
miles wide. The night of 15 December<br />
w<strong>as</strong> frosty and clear, offering good visi-<br />
bility for the l<strong>as</strong>t moves to the line of<br />
departure. On the right the forty guns<br />
of the <strong>as</strong>sault gun brigade took station<br />
2 1t will be recalled that the 106th had noticed<br />
unusual vehicular noise. See above, p. 59.
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 145<br />
near the dragon's teeth. On the left the<br />
two <strong>as</strong>sault regiments of the 62d Volks<br />
Grenadier Division moved for the first<br />
time into the positions held earlier by<br />
the 26th Volks Grenadier Division. Also<br />
for the first time, the <strong>as</strong>sault company<br />
commanders heard officially of the great<br />
counteroffensive and were given instruc-<br />
tions <strong>as</strong> to their own particular roles.<br />
With <strong>as</strong>sembly completed, the juxta-<br />
position of German and American for-<br />
mations on the morning of 16 December<br />
w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong> follows. The boundary between<br />
the Fifth and Sixth Panzer Armies bi-<br />
sected the 14th Cavalry Group area by<br />
an extension south of Krewinkel and<br />
Manderfeld. North of the line elements<br />
of the 3d Parachute Division, reinforced<br />
by tanks, faced two platoons of Troop<br />
C, 18th Cavalry Squadron, two recon-<br />
naissance platoons and one gun company<br />
of the 820th Tank Destroyer Battalion,<br />
plus the squadron and group head-<br />
quarters at Manderfeld. South of the<br />
boundary the 294th and 295th Regi-<br />
ments of the 18th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion, forty <strong>as</strong>sault guns, and a reinforced<br />
tank destroyer battalion faced Troop A<br />
and one platoon of Troop C, 18th Cav-<br />
alry Squadron. On no other part of the<br />
American front would the enemy so out-<br />
number the defenders at the start of the<br />
Ardennes counteroffensive.<br />
On the Schnee Eifel the 422d Infan-<br />
try, composing the left wing of the 106th<br />
Division, had only minute screening<br />
elements opposite. The 423d Infantry,<br />
with one flank on the Schnee Eifel range<br />
and the other in the Bleialf depression,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> in the path of the 293d Regiment<br />
(18th Volks Grenadier Division). The<br />
424th Infantry, in positions running to<br />
the southwest, stood opposite the 62d<br />
Volks Grenadier Division. In the event<br />
that the neighboring corps south of the<br />
LXVI made progress, one of its regi-<br />
ments, the 60th Regiment (116th Pan-<br />
zer Division), would be brought against<br />
the right flank of the 424th Infantry.<br />
The compilation of opposing forces,<br />
above, will show that the odds against<br />
the defender in the Schnee Eifel area<br />
were not inordinate-except in the cav-<br />
alry sector. The Germans would have to<br />
make the utmost use of surprise, con-<br />
centration of effort, and ground favor-<br />
able to attack, if they were to achieve<br />
any large me<strong>as</strong>ure of success. Fully aware<br />
that the American line had numerous<br />
weak spots and that no substantial re-<br />
serves were near, General Lucht and his<br />
division commanders saw three factors<br />
that might limit success: the weakness<br />
of the 18th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
center, enemy superiority in the artil-<br />
lery arm, and strong intervention by<br />
unfriendly air. All evidence of the play<br />
of these factors, particularly the l<strong>as</strong>t two,<br />
would be carefully observed <strong>as</strong> D-day<br />
came.<br />
Although the LXVI advance on 16<br />
December w<strong>as</strong> planned and effected <strong>as</strong><br />
the co-ordinated effort of two divisions,<br />
the story must begin with the 18th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division attack. This in turn<br />
will follow the German scheme of ma-<br />
neuver, the right wing first, then the<br />
left. The fight in the zone of the 424th<br />
Infantry quickly becomes an independ-<br />
ent action and will be so considered?<br />
The Attack in the Losheim Gap<br />
The shock companies of the 18th be-<br />
gan to move toward the American cav-<br />
alry positions about. 0400 on 16<br />
3 See also ch. XVII.
146 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
December. An hour later the main<br />
strength of the two attacking regiments<br />
followed, the 294th advancing toward<br />
Weckerath and the Our valley, the 295th<br />
heading for Roth and Kobscheid. Sup-<br />
porting artillery, mortars, and Werfers<br />
opened fire over the heads of the Ger-<br />
man infantry shortly after 0830. (Actu-<br />
ally the first concentrations to arouse the<br />
Americans were fired <strong>as</strong> part of the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> artillery preparation<br />
prior to H-hour and landed in the north-<br />
ern part of the 14th Cavalry zone) . Roth<br />
and Kobscheid, closest to the enemy<br />
jump-off positions, received only one<br />
battery salvo; apparently the German<br />
infantry were already around the vil-<br />
lages. When day broke, cloudy and<br />
drizzling, the <strong>as</strong>sault force moving be-<br />
tween Weckerath and Roth w<strong>as</strong> well on<br />
its way to the commanding crossroads<br />
village of Auw. Visibility w<strong>as</strong> so poor,<br />
the American village positions so dis-<br />
persed, that the cavalrymen for some<br />
time did not detect nor engage the infan-<br />
try moving p<strong>as</strong>t. (The Germans, having<br />
received no fire, first suspected that the<br />
main American line had been moved<br />
back to the Our River.) Furthermore,<br />
predawn attacks on Roth and Kobscheid<br />
had occupied the attention of the<br />
troopers. At Roth a company of grena-<br />
diers w<strong>as</strong> checked by shellfire. The<br />
attackers at Kobscheid actually got in-<br />
side the cavalry defense, but nearly forty<br />
were captured.<br />
Before dawn none of the village gar-<br />
risons in the southern sector had been<br />
seriously menaced. The effects of the<br />
enemy penetrations, however, became<br />
apparent soon after daylight. At 0830<br />
a message from Roth reported that the<br />
Germans were inside the village, that<br />
a tank seventy-five yards from the com-<br />
mand post w<strong>as</strong> “belting us with direct<br />
fire.” Light tanks, dispatched from Man-<br />
derfeld, hurried to give aid but were<br />
stopped cold by fire from Auw, some<br />
3,500 yards to the west, which w<strong>as</strong> occu-<br />
pied by the Germans. Nothing more w<strong>as</strong><br />
heard from Roth. The remainder of<br />
Troop A, in Kobscheid, also w<strong>as</strong> cut off;<br />
by 0900 the attackers had established a<br />
hold inside the village. Weckerath,<br />
which lay to one side of the German<br />
advance on Auw, w<strong>as</strong> hit by elements<br />
of the 294th. Here the 3d Platoon of<br />
Troop C w<strong>as</strong> located e<strong>as</strong>t of the village<br />
in a small patch of woods on the road to<br />
Krewinkel, well dug in and protected<br />
by barbed wire on all sides. The first<br />
German <strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong> checked by mortars<br />
and machine guns, reinforced by accu-<br />
rate artillery fire. Two enemy com-<br />
panies, however, swept around the wood<br />
and converged on the village, w<strong>here</strong><br />
some twenty men of Troop C headquar-<br />
ters held them at bay with bullet fire.<br />
A platoon of American light tanks ar-<br />
rived from Manderfeld shortly after<br />
0930, appearing just in time to engage<br />
groups of enemy infantry infiltrating the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern edge of the village. At 1100<br />
observers at Weckerath saw an enemy<br />
column moving from Roth in the direc-<br />
tion of Auw. They counted fifteen<br />
“tanks”–probably a battalion of <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns–and at le<strong>as</strong>t one battalion of foot<br />
troops, marching intermixed with the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns. Artillery fire w<strong>as</strong> directed<br />
onto the column, with but little effect.<br />
The Germans pressed on to the west.<br />
In the northern sector of the 14th<br />
Cavalry Group fortune had treated the<br />
defenders with mixed favor during the<br />
morning. The German force committed<br />
<strong>here</strong> consisted of a reinforced regiment<br />
of the 3d Parachute Division (it will be
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 147<br />
recalled that the boundary between the<br />
Fifth and Sixth Panzer Armies ran just<br />
south of Krewinkel and Manderfeld)<br />
attacking initially without the support of<br />
heavy weapons. The 3d Parachute Divi-<br />
sion axis cut straight through the north-<br />
ern cavalry sector, then angled northwest<br />
in the direction of Faymonville, the divi-<br />
sion advancing <strong>as</strong> the left flank of the I<br />
SS Panzer Corps. At Krewinkel, the most<br />
advanced American post in the area,<br />
the 2d Platoon of Troop C and a<br />
reconnaissance platoon of Company A,<br />
820th Tank Destroyer Battalion, occu-<br />
pied a position from which excellent<br />
observation and fields of fire covered all<br />
approaches to the village from the e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
An hour before dawn a German shock<br />
company boldly approached the village<br />
in column of fours. The troopers held<br />
their fire until the enemy infantry were<br />
within twenty yards of the outer strands<br />
of wire–then cut loose. The column dis-<br />
integrated, but the <strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong> quickly<br />
resumed in more open order and shortly<br />
the Germans were in the village streets.<br />
At one point half the village w<strong>as</strong> in Ger-<br />
man hands, but eventually the defenders<br />
got the upper hand and the enemy with-<br />
drew.<br />
One of the l<strong>as</strong>t to leave shouted in<br />
English, “Take a ten minute break.<br />
We’ll be back.” An ex<strong>as</strong>perated trooper<br />
h<strong>as</strong>tened to <strong>as</strong>sure him profanely,<br />
“– – –, we’ll still be <strong>here</strong>.” With the full<br />
morning light the enemy returned, <strong>as</strong><br />
promised, after his artillery had tried<br />
unsuccessfully to jar the Americans loose.<br />
Head-on <strong>as</strong>sault from the e<strong>as</strong>t by fresh<br />
troops made no progress. By noon, but<br />
two of the defenders had been wounded.<br />
The troopers estimated that the German<br />
dead now totaled 375—doubtless an exag-<br />
gerated figure but still an indication of<br />
the costliness of the German tactics. At<br />
the neighboring village of Afst, the 1st<br />
Platoon of Troop C w<strong>as</strong> similarly<br />
attacked. The platoon beat off two<br />
enemy companies, with heavy loss to the<br />
Germans.<br />
The American left wing w<strong>as</strong> composed<br />
of Company A and two reconnaissance<br />
platoons of the 820th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion, occupying the villages of Ber-<br />
terath, Merlscheid, and Lanzerath. The<br />
3-inch towed guns, sited to cover the<br />
roads and e<strong>as</strong>tern approaches, had no<br />
protection whatever. The gun sections<br />
were unable to put up more than short<br />
resistance to the German infantry, nor<br />
could most of the pieces be hooked up<br />
and towed out with the enemy already<br />
in the position. Here <strong>as</strong> elsew<strong>here</strong> dur-<br />
ing the Ardennes fighting the towed tank<br />
destroyer lacked the maneuverability to<br />
deal with infiltration or to displace when<br />
in danger. Three tank destroyers were<br />
pulled back toward Manderfeld and bet-<br />
ter firing positions; the rest, with one<br />
exception, were destroyed on orders.<br />
Most of the company reached the cavalry<br />
group headquarters at Manderfeld and<br />
continued the fight <strong>as</strong> infantry.<br />
Colonel Devine and the staffs of the<br />
14th Cavalry Group and 18th Cavalry<br />
Squadron had been alerted by the first<br />
shells of the opening predawn concen-<br />
tration dropping on Manderfeld. Tele-<br />
phone wires went out during the bar-<br />
rage, and radio communication w<strong>as</strong><br />
made difficult by the cacaphony of pho-<br />
nograph records introduced by the Ger-<br />
mans along the American wave lengths.<br />
About 0600 the 14th Cavalry Group ex-<br />
ecutive officer talked by phone to the<br />
106th Division command post and <strong>as</strong>ked<br />
for wire teams to restore the lines.<br />
Whether he <strong>as</strong>ked for permission to
148 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
move up the 32d Cavalry Squadron<br />
is uncertain. In any event the orders<br />
from the division were to alert the re-<br />
serve squadron, but not to move it.<br />
At 0640 another call from Manderfeld<br />
reached the command post at St. Vith,<br />
this time with a request to move the<br />
32d forward to a position halfway<br />
between the division and group com-<br />
mand posts. Twenty-five minutes<br />
later the G–3 journal of the 106th Divi-<br />
sion records a telephone order to the<br />
cavalry: “Move 32 Cavalry Squadron <strong>as</strong><br />
soon <strong>as</strong> you like.” This squadron had<br />
been resting and refitting, indeed some<br />
of its vehicles were partially dis<strong>as</strong>sem-<br />
bled when the alert order arrived. About<br />
0930 the squadron w<strong>as</strong> on the road,<br />
minus Company F, which took another<br />
hour and a half to ready its light tanks<br />
for movement.<br />
Colonel Devine, realizing that the for-<br />
ward platoons of the 18th Cavalry<br />
Squadron were in danger of destruction<br />
and could make no more futile efforts,<br />
cut off and isolated <strong>as</strong> they were, planned<br />
to make a stand along the Manderfeld<br />
ridge. This ridge line w<strong>as</strong> some 3,000<br />
yards in the rear of the original cavalry<br />
line and about twice that distance from<br />
the West Wall positions out of which the<br />
German attack had erupted. Devine in-<br />
tended to defend along the ridge with<br />
the 32d Squadron and thus cover the<br />
withdrawal of his forward troops. Short-<br />
ly after 1100 the fresh squadron reached<br />
Manderfeld, Troop E moving its <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault guns into previously reconnoitered<br />
positions at Manderfeld, Troop C de-<br />
ploying northwest of the town to cover<br />
the road from Lanzerath, and two dis-<br />
mounted platoons of Troop A digging<br />
in southwest of Manderfeld. While this<br />
area defense w<strong>as</strong> forming, Troop B took<br />
stations near Andler; at this village, just<br />
west of the German spearhead in Auw,<br />
the Our bridge remained an intact and<br />
important prize. The remainder of<br />
Troop A w<strong>as</strong> dispatched to Holzheim,<br />
t<strong>here</strong> to cover the group’s left and rear.<br />
Shortly before the arrival of the 32d<br />
Cavalry Squadron, Devine had <strong>as</strong>ked<br />
General Jones to make a counterattack<br />
north from the 106th Division area. He<br />
w<strong>as</strong> told that no infantry support could<br />
be given “at this time.” When Devine<br />
answered that he would have to with-<br />
draw in the south to a line from Mander-<br />
feld through Verschneid, Jones made no<br />
comment. Thus far, it must be said, t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> little or no inclination at the 106th<br />
Division headquarters to regard the sit-<br />
uation in the cavalry sector <strong>as</strong> unduly<br />
serious. Devine’s final comment during<br />
this telephone conversation–that he in-<br />
tended to counterattack with the 32d<br />
Cavalry Squadron on its arrival and<br />
attempt to restore the Krewinkel-Roth-<br />
Kobscheid line–may have helped con-<br />
firm the somewhat optimistic view held<br />
at the division headquarters.<br />
At noon Colonel Devine finally issued<br />
withdrawal orders to the 18th Cavalry<br />
Squadron. Troop C alone w<strong>as</strong> able to<br />
comply. The 3d Platoon, which had held<br />
its own in the fight e<strong>as</strong>t of Weckerath,<br />
mounted two armored cars and a few<br />
jeeps, then made its way with guns<br />
blazing into the village. Here the com-<br />
mand post group and light tanks joined,<br />
the column moving west along roads<br />
lined with German riflemen, but this<br />
w<strong>as</strong> no headlong d<strong>as</strong>h because cold<br />
motors and congealed transmission<br />
gre<strong>as</strong>e slowed the column to fifteen<br />
miles per hour. Meanwhile the village it<br />
had just left w<strong>as</strong> bl<strong>as</strong>ted by a terrific<br />
shelling–apparently the Germans had
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 149<br />
been preparing for a final <strong>as</strong>sault. The<br />
garrisons at Krewinkel and Afst moved<br />
back at 1240 without incident. As Kre-<br />
winkel w<strong>as</strong> lost to view the troopers<br />
could see German infantry swarming in<br />
from the e<strong>as</strong>t. 4 When Troop C and the<br />
light tanks reached Manderfeld, the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault gun troop, which had been de-<br />
ployed along the ridge north and south<br />
of the town, poured direct fire on the<br />
enemy now streaming southwest through<br />
the draws at the source of the Our River.<br />
The morning fog had lifted and the<br />
gunners were able to inflict considerable<br />
damage with their 75-mm. howitzers.<br />
The story of the garrisons in Roth and<br />
Kobscheid is difficult to reconstruct, al-<br />
though the troopers held on for some<br />
hours after being surrounded. In the<br />
early part of the fight, forward obser-<br />
vers in Kobscheid were in contact with<br />
the 275th Armored Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talion; this artillery support unquestion-<br />
ably w<strong>as</strong> of signal aid to the troopers,<br />
<strong>as</strong> were the quad‘ mounts of the 413th<br />
Antiaircraft Battalion which were sent<br />
to help the Roth defenders. About 1100<br />
the Roth command post radioed Kob-<br />
scheid that the troops of the 106th Divi-<br />
sion farther south were moving back,<br />
that the Roth garrison would try to with-<br />
draw, and that the Kobscheid group<br />
should do likewise. Apparently the<br />
German grip on Roth w<strong>as</strong> too firm;<br />
sometime during the afternoon the<br />
troopers t<strong>here</strong> surrendered. Kobscheid<br />
held out until about 1630. Then, <strong>as</strong> dusk<br />
settled, sixty-one men led by 1st Lt.<br />
Lorenz Herdrick started through the<br />
4 These troops were armored infantry from the<br />
1st SS Panzer Division whose commander finally<br />
had thrown them in to get the attack rolling.<br />
snow cross-country in a westerly direction.<br />
They returned to the American<br />
lines at St. Vith on 19 December. 5<br />
Early in the afternoon it w<strong>as</strong> apparent<br />
to the force at Manderfeld that the Germans<br />
were pushing west around both<br />
flanks. A patrol sent in the direction of<br />
Auw reported that the entrance to the<br />
Our valley w<strong>as</strong> wide open, contact with<br />
the 99th Division in the north had been<br />
lost, and the 106th Division reported<br />
that it lacked the troops to counterattack<br />
toward the cavalry. Colonel Devine<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore organized a t<strong>as</strong>k force about<br />
1400 to retake the ground around Lanzerath<br />
and thus cover his northern flank.<br />
The t<strong>as</strong>k force, commanded by Maj.<br />
J. L. Mayes, consisted of Troop C<br />
and the <strong>as</strong>sault gun troop of the 18th<br />
Cavalry Squadron. Moving north the<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force reached a road junction 1,600<br />
yards north of Manderfeld, w<strong>here</strong> it w<strong>as</strong><br />
beset from three sides by infantry and<br />
self-propelled guns. The cavalry selfpropelled<br />
howitzers were able to maneuver<br />
and do considerable execution in this<br />
close-range fire fight, but the counterattack<br />
w<strong>as</strong> checked. By this time the<br />
situation on the opposite flank w<strong>as</strong><br />
precarious; the Germans already had<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed through Wischeid, southwest of<br />
Manderfeld, and were moving toward<br />
the Our bridge at Andler.<br />
Shortly after four o’clock the 14th<br />
Cavalry Group executive officer telephoned<br />
the 106th Division command<br />
post and <strong>as</strong>ked permission to withdraw<br />
to the line Andler-Holzheim, a position<br />
5 Three members of the 18th Cavalry Recon-<br />
naissance Squadron were. awarded the DSC for<br />
gallantry in the battle at the villages: 1st Lt.<br />
A. L. Mills, S. Sgt. Woodrow W. Reeves, and Cpl.<br />
C. E. Statler.
150<br />
represented by a series of ridges covered<br />
on the e<strong>as</strong>t by a tributary of the Our.<br />
The division headquarters authorized<br />
the withdrawal. Devine ordered T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Mayes to fight a delaying action<br />
southwest along the road from Losheim,<br />
while the Manderfeld defenders with-<br />
drew to the west. This movement w<strong>as</strong><br />
carried through successfully, the 32d<br />
Cavalry howitzers on the Manderfeld<br />
ridge ably supporting the t<strong>as</strong>k force. The<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t troops left Manderfeld about 1700,<br />
setting the town afire in an attempt to<br />
destroy records of value to the enemy.<br />
Troops E and C of the 18th reached<br />
Holzheim at twilight, joining Troop A<br />
of the 32d which already w<strong>as</strong> in position<br />
<strong>as</strong> the anchor of the 14th Cavalry north<br />
flank. Troop B of the 32d had remained<br />
at Andler since its morning arrival; it<br />
now screened the southern flank with<br />
reconnaissance teams pushing out on the<br />
roads to south, e<strong>as</strong>t, and north. The light<br />
tank company of the 32d Squadron w<strong>as</strong><br />
disposed to the southwest of the cavalry<br />
line at Heuem, covering the road from<br />
Schönberg to St. Vith and worrying<br />
about the absence of communications.<br />
The remainder of the 32d Squadron w<strong>as</strong><br />
at Herresbach and that of the 18th<br />
Squadron near Wereth, both villages be-<br />
hind the Holzheim-Andler line. By early<br />
evening the 14th Cavalry Group w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
its defensive positions, except for such<br />
regrouping <strong>as</strong> would be needed to sort<br />
out elements of the two squadrons. Its<br />
supporting artillery battalion (the<br />
275th) w<strong>as</strong> in the process of moving to<br />
new positions near St. Vith. As yet t<strong>here</strong><br />
were no signs of an enemy pursuit. The<br />
forward artillery observers were active<br />
“along the deserted front” until 1900 but<br />
found nothing to report. Contact with<br />
the Germans had been lost.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
The German attack in the Losheim<br />
Gap during 16 December had gone ac-<br />
cording to schedule. The northern arm<br />
of the 18th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
envelopment had penetrated <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong><br />
Auw and overrun most of the American<br />
artillery positions. As daylight ended the<br />
294th Regiment <strong>as</strong>sembled around Auw<br />
and the 295th regrouped in the Roth-<br />
Kobscheid area, both awaiting the<br />
arrival of their heavy weapons. Now<br />
General Lucht told the division com-<br />
mander to call forward his armored mo-<br />
bile battalion and send it to join the<br />
294th and elements of the <strong>as</strong>sault gun<br />
brigade the next morning in a drive<br />
on Andler. In the north the 3d Para-<br />
chute Division continued its advance<br />
during the night, marching through<br />
the rough, heavily forested area north-<br />
west of Manderfeld and Lanzerath.<br />
Along the roads to the e<strong>as</strong>t the armored<br />
formations of the 1st SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sion toiled forward in the dark, ready<br />
to push through the opening between<br />
the American 99th Division and the<br />
14th Cavalry Group. As things stood,<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore, the 14th Cavalry w<strong>as</strong> deploy-<br />
ed in the gap which w<strong>as</strong> opening <strong>as</strong><br />
the 18th Volks Grenadier Division con-<br />
tinued westward and the 3d Parachute<br />
Division angled toward the northwest.<br />
The cavalry flanks, however, rested on<br />
roads which would be essential to the<br />
enemy–roads along which the German<br />
armor w<strong>as</strong> moving for commitment on<br />
the second day of the offensive. In the<br />
meantime the 14th Cavalry Group com-<br />
mander had gone to St. Vith to explain<br />
to the 106th Division staff his situation<br />
and the arrangements he had made. Gen-<br />
eral Jones, busy with plans for a counter-<br />
attack by armored reinforcements which<br />
the corps commander had promised for
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE ElFEL<br />
the next morning, had no comment to<br />
offer and merely <strong>as</strong>ked Colonel Devine<br />
to wait at the command post.<br />
The Attack Hits the<br />
106th Division<br />
The 14th Cavalry Group withdrawal<br />
to the Holzheim-Andler line in the late<br />
afternoon of 16 December had no prac-<br />
tical adverse effect on its southern neigh-<br />
bor, the 422d Infantry. By this time the<br />
enemy thrust had driven so deep and<br />
with such force between the cavalry and<br />
the 422d that the northern flank of the<br />
106th Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong> exposed re-<br />
gardless of movements undertaken by<br />
the cavalry. Ominous events had tran-<br />
spired in the zone of the 106th.<br />
Seven of the nine rifle battalions under<br />
General Jones’ command were in the line<br />
on the morning of 16 December. The 2d<br />
Battalion, 423d Infantry, w<strong>as</strong> in division<br />
reserve near Born, 5,000 yards north of<br />
St. Vith. The 1st Battalion, 424th Infan-<br />
try, w<strong>as</strong> located at Steinebruck on the<br />
road to Winterspelt and also w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
division reserve. The 422d Infantry had<br />
its three battalions in the West Wall<br />
positions on the Schnee Eifel, defending<br />
a front of eight to nine thousand yards.<br />
Attached w<strong>as</strong> Company A, 8 1st Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion; direct support w<strong>as</strong><br />
given by the 589th Field Artillery Battal-<br />
ion whose batteries were emplaced<br />
southwest of Auw. Located west of Auw<br />
were the 155-mm. howitzers of the 592d<br />
Field Artillery Battalion. The regimen-<br />
tal command post w<strong>as</strong> in the crossroads<br />
village of Schlausenbach, with the can-<br />
non company to the west on Hill 612.<br />
All of these locations lay in the northern<br />
section of the regimental area not far<br />
from the 14th Cavalry Group boundary.<br />
151<br />
A company of engineers occupied Auw,<br />
the most important road center in the<br />
422d sector. The forward positions of<br />
the 422d in the West Wall were b<strong>as</strong>ed on<br />
a series of heavily wooded ridges running<br />
north and south. However a number of<br />
ravines, densely screened by trees, led<br />
directly back into the regimental area;<br />
one such ran straight down to Schlausen-<br />
bach.<br />
The 423d Infantry–in the division<br />
center–w<strong>as</strong> deployed on a curving line<br />
a little more than 8,000 yards long, with<br />
one battalion in the West Wall, the<br />
other bending around the southern nose<br />
of the Schnee Eifel and back to the west.<br />
A gap existed between the rifle battalion<br />
positions and the village of Bleialf. The<br />
regimental right wing w<strong>as</strong> fleshed out by<br />
a provisional battalion (the antitank<br />
company, one platoon of the cannon<br />
company, a rifle platoon, and Troop B,<br />
18th Cavalry Squadron) . This scratch<br />
force, acting <strong>as</strong> riflemen, w<strong>as</strong> reinforced<br />
by Company C, 820th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion. The 590th Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talion supported the regiment from posi-<br />
tions northwest of Oberl<strong>as</strong>cheid, and the<br />
regimental cannon company w<strong>as</strong> close to<br />
that village.<br />
The 424th Infantry held a six-mile<br />
line angled slightly from the Ihren<br />
Creek southwestward to the vicinity of<br />
Grosskampenberg. The gap between it<br />
and the 423d, a distance of 4,000 yards,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> screened thinly by the 106th Recon-<br />
naissance Troop and the cannon com-<br />
pany. The 591st Field Artillery<br />
Battalion w<strong>as</strong> situated behind the regi-<br />
mental center with two battalions for-<br />
ward and one in the rear to cover any<br />
displacement.<br />
During the evening of 15 December<br />
enemy aircraft droned through the air
152<br />
over the 106th Division lines attempting<br />
to divert attention from the noise created<br />
by the German ground columns moving<br />
forward to the line of departure. Their<br />
efforts were w<strong>as</strong>ted. The vehicular activ-<br />
ity behind the German front w<strong>as</strong> heard<br />
and duly recorded, but it caused no<br />
alarm. Enemy patrols also were unusu-<br />
ally active during the night–except at<br />
the Schnee Eifel positions of the 422d<br />
Infantry which did not figure in the<br />
German attack plans. Again t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
particular reaction among the Ameri-<br />
cans. No one anticipated a German at-<br />
tack, although with the advantage of<br />
hindsight all these warning signs and<br />
others would be resurrected and given<br />
an importance never accorded them on<br />
the night of 15 December.<br />
At 0530, 16 December, the guns,<br />
Werfers, and mortars of the LX VI Corps<br />
opened fire, marking the commence-<br />
ment of the advance against the 106th<br />
Division. The artillery available to the<br />
LXVI w<strong>as</strong> limited, by comparison with<br />
most other parts of the front, but w<strong>as</strong><br />
well served by its forward observers and<br />
did much damage to telephone wire,<br />
ammunition dumps, and other supply<br />
points. The first word from a specific<br />
target reached the division headquar-<br />
ters at St. Vith about 0550, a report<br />
that the 423d Antitank Company had<br />
been shelled since 0530. The 423d In-<br />
fantry w<strong>as</strong> in fact bearing the brunt of<br />
the enemy barrage and most of its tele-<br />
phone lines to the forward units went<br />
out in the first few minutes. Within the<br />
hour messages from the 28th Division<br />
and the 99th Division told of heavy shell-<br />
ing to the south and the north of the<br />
106th. But the German <strong>as</strong>sault troops<br />
who had been moving forward in the<br />
darkness onto the 106th positions since<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
0500 were not immediately detected.<br />
German pressure would first be felt in<br />
these are<strong>as</strong> within the regimental sec-<br />
tors: the Heckhuscheid and Winterspelt<br />
are<strong>as</strong> (424th Infantry) ; the Bleialf area<br />
(423d Infantry); and on the Auw-<br />
Schonberg road (422d Infantry). In the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t c<strong>as</strong>e, the northern <strong>as</strong>sault wing of<br />
the 18th Volks Grenadier Division con-<br />
centric attack would strike the Ameri-<br />
can cavalry before turning on the north<br />
flank of the 106th Division.<br />
At dusk on 15 December the 62d Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, forming the left of<br />
the LXVI Corps, had come into the lines<br />
opposite the left and center of the 424th<br />
Infantry. This new division would have<br />
no opportunity to reconnoiter the bro-<br />
ken and heavily wooded ground over<br />
which it w<strong>as</strong> to advance the next morn-<br />
ing-a fact which had direct bearing on<br />
the subsequent story of the 424th In-<br />
fantry-but its scheme of maneuver<br />
had been given detailed study. The<br />
attack would open with two regiments<br />
abre<strong>as</strong>t attempting a breakthrough on<br />
a wide front. The main effort would<br />
be made in the vicinity of Winterspelt,<br />
breaching the American switch line<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t of that village and thus gaining<br />
entrance to the main macadam road<br />
to St. Vith. Once in position <strong>as</strong>tride<br />
the road, the mobile reserve of the<br />
62d would be committed for the pene-<br />
tration, while the two regiments ex-<br />
tended their hold on either side of<br />
the road. On the left, t<strong>here</strong>fore, the<br />
183d Regiment had <strong>as</strong> its objective the<br />
northern side of the plateau on which<br />
lay the village of Heckhuscheid. Pos-<br />
session of this high ground w<strong>as</strong> deemed<br />
essential to the German plan. On the<br />
right the 190th Regiment aimed at the<br />
wooded heights at Eigelscheid around
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 153<br />
which twisted the road to Winterspelt,<br />
two thousand yards westward.<br />
The 3d Battalion of the 424th Infan-<br />
try received the first German blow in<br />
its positions north of Heckhuscheid. Af-<br />
ter a 20-minute concentration of artil-<br />
lery and mortar fire a shock company<br />
of the 183d drove in on Companies K and<br />
L about 0645. Although the defenders<br />
got word back to their own artillery,<br />
when daylight came the enemy had pen-<br />
etrated well into the position. The 3d<br />
Battalion, however, w<strong>as</strong> on ground<br />
which favored the defender and not un-<br />
duly extended. The most serious threat<br />
developed to the north on the weak flank<br />
screening the switch position. Here the<br />
regimental cannon company (Capt.<br />
Joseph Freesland) , armed only with rifles<br />
and machine guns, w<strong>as</strong> deployed at<br />
the Weissenhof crossroads blocking the<br />
main road to Winterspelt. Guided by<br />
fl<strong>as</strong>hlights and flares the Germans made<br />
their attack in column, advancing erect,<br />
shouting and screaming. The cannon-<br />
eers, nothing daunted, did well in their<br />
infantry role, holding for several hours<br />
against <strong>as</strong>sault from front and flank.<br />
Colonel Reid, the regimental command-<br />
er, ordered his 1st Battalion, in reserve<br />
at Steinebruck, to the support of the<br />
threatened north flank. Company C<br />
arrived to reinforce the cannon com-<br />
pany and the rest of the reserve bat-<br />
talion hurriedly established defensive<br />
positions to the rear at Winterspelt.<br />
In the 3d Battalion zone Company I<br />
came in to help restore the line. A se-<br />
ries of counterattacks, well supported by<br />
fire from the 591st Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talion, er<strong>as</strong>ed the dents in the Ameri-<br />
can position, and a sortie led by the<br />
battalion S–3, Capt. Lee Berwick,<br />
entered Heckhuscheid and took 107<br />
prisoners. A four-man patrol from<br />
Company K rounded up another forty<br />
prisoners in the woods nearby, By noon<br />
the 424th had driven the enemy back<br />
along the whole of its front.<br />
Coincidentally and without realizing<br />
what had been accomplished, the south-<br />
ern elements of the 424th put a crimp<br />
in the plans of the Germans attacking<br />
to outflank the neighboring 112th In-<br />
fantry. Men of the 2d Battalion, sup-<br />
ported by the 3d Platoon of Company<br />
B, 820th Tank Destroyer Battalion,<br />
caught the <strong>as</strong>sault company leading the<br />
60th Panzer Grenadier Regiment attack<br />
in a wood west of Grosskampenberg.<br />
German reports say that the company<br />
w<strong>as</strong> “nearly destroyed.” This sharp set-<br />
back so discouraged the 116th Panzer<br />
Division commander that before the day<br />
ended he switched the 60th Panzer Gren-<br />
adier Regiment to the south. Although<br />
this attempt to drive a wedge between<br />
the 112th and 424th w<strong>as</strong> not renewed,<br />
the latter w<strong>as</strong> able to give its neighbors<br />
a helping hand later in the day. During<br />
the afternoon a gunner from the tank<br />
destroyer platoon, Pfc. Paul C. Rosen-<br />
thal, sighted five German tanks and a<br />
truck moving north of Lützkampen. Fir-<br />
ing his 3-inch gun at 2,000 yards range<br />
he destroyed all, tanks and truck; he<br />
had used only eighteen rounds of high-<br />
explosive and armor-piercing-capped<br />
ammunition.<br />
About noon a report reached the 62d<br />
Volks Grenadier Division command post<br />
that troops of the 190th Regiment (the<br />
Germans who had broken through north<br />
of the cannon company positions)<br />
were on high ground north of Eigel-<br />
scheid overlooking the road to Winter-<br />
spelt. General Kittel ordered his mobile<br />
battalion up from the 164th Regiment
154<br />
reserve at Pronsfeld and into the attack<br />
along the Winterspelt road. This battal-<br />
ion, “mobile” in the sense that it w<strong>as</strong><br />
mounted on bicycles and reinforced by<br />
a company of self-propelled <strong>as</strong>sault guns,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> forced to stick to the macadam road.<br />
As a result it came up against the Amer-<br />
ican cannon company at the Weissenhof<br />
crossroads. Outnumbered and in dan-<br />
ger of encirclement the cannoneers<br />
and their rifle support from Company<br />
C made a deliberate and fighting with-<br />
drawal toward Winterspelt, platoon.<br />
by platoon. When the 2d Platoon w<strong>as</strong><br />
ordered back, its commander (Lt. Craw-<br />
ford Wheeler) stayed behind with a ba-<br />
zooka to meet the leading <strong>as</strong>sault gun<br />
and w<strong>as</strong> killed by point-blank fire.<br />
By dark the German mobile battal-<br />
ion and infantry from the 190th Regi-<br />
ment were closing in on Winterspelt,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> the 1st Battalion and remnants<br />
of the cannon company stood ready to<br />
meet them. The fight raged through<br />
the evening and by midnight at le<strong>as</strong>t a<br />
company of Germans w<strong>as</strong> inside the<br />
village, with more coming in by the<br />
hour. In the 3d Battalion sector the en-<br />
emy had got now<strong>here</strong> with his frontal<br />
attacks around Heckhuscheid, the vil-<br />
lage remaining under American control<br />
at the close of the day. C<strong>as</strong>ualties in the<br />
62d Volks Grenadier Division had been<br />
substantial, particularly, <strong>as</strong> might be ex-<br />
pected in the c<strong>as</strong>e of a green division<br />
in its first attack, among the officers.<br />
Losses in the 424th had not been high.<br />
But the position of the regiment on the<br />
night of the 16th w<strong>as</strong> potentially a se-<br />
rious one–despite the rough body check<br />
given the enemy. The battalion and<br />
regimental reserves all had been com-<br />
mitted, the 591st Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talion had fired nearly all its ammuni-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tion (over 2,600 rounds), and the en-<br />
emy had made a dent toward Winter-<br />
spelt. Contact with the 112th Infantry,<br />
on the south flank, had been lost. But<br />
fortunately the enemy had given over<br />
the idea of a penetration <strong>here</strong>.<br />
The intense fire laid on the 423d In-<br />
fantry on the morning of 16 December<br />
had disrupted telephone lines, but the<br />
radio net seems to have functioned well.<br />
By 0600 the regimental commander had<br />
word that his antitank company w<strong>as</strong><br />
under small arms fire at Bleialf, the key<br />
to the southern route around the Schnee<br />
Eifel and the Alf Creek depression. A-<br />
long this depression extended the 423d’s<br />
weak wing, echeloned to the right and<br />
rear of the two rifle battalions, one on<br />
the Schnee Eifel and one curving along<br />
the southern nose of the range. The<br />
heterogeneous units screening along<br />
the wing had been grouped <strong>as</strong> a pro-<br />
visional battalion, but they formed no<br />
cohesive front and were charged with<br />
defending the le<strong>as</strong>t defensible ground<br />
on the regimental front. When shock<br />
troops of the 293d Regiment (18th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division) struck the antitank<br />
company in Bleialf, one group filtered<br />
into the village and another, marching<br />
along the railroad, cut between Bleialf<br />
and Troop B (18th Cavalry Squadron),<br />
blocking out the latter and destroying<br />
the right platoon of the antitank com-<br />
pany.<br />
Although radio reception w<strong>as</strong> poor in<br />
this area the commander of the 423d<br />
Infantry and the regimental executive<br />
(Lt. Col. Frederick W. Nagle) were<br />
able to alert and move reserves<br />
promptly, but Colonel Cavender’s re-<br />
quest for the rele<strong>as</strong>e of his 2d Battalion,<br />
then in division reserve, w<strong>as</strong> refused.<br />
About 0930 the service company and
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 155<br />
cannon company were at Bleialf, w<strong>here</strong><br />
they found most of the village held by<br />
the Germans. Later Company B, 81st En-<br />
gineer Combat Battalion, and the head-<br />
quarters company were thrown into the<br />
fight. By 1500 these units had ejected<br />
the enemy from Bleialf after a series of<br />
hand-to-hand fights in the streets and<br />
houses. The cavalry troop on the ex-<br />
treme regimental right remained cut<br />
off from the friendly troops to the north.<br />
Finally getting permission by radio to<br />
withdraw, the troopers pulled back in<br />
the early afternoon to Winterscheid,<br />
2,500 yards southwest of Bleialf. While<br />
the enemy w<strong>as</strong> attacking around Bleialf,<br />
a few small patrols tried to get into the<br />
positions of the 1st and 3d Battalions<br />
to the north–but no real attack w<strong>as</strong><br />
attempted during the 16th.<br />
The 293d had failed to carry out its<br />
part <strong>as</strong> the southern jaw of the 18th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division pincers, for<br />
without Bleialf the road to Steinebrück<br />
w<strong>as</strong> barred. The Americans had recov-<br />
ered their balance quickly after the in-<br />
itial shock at Bleialf. The battalions<br />
on the Schnee Eifel had brought the<br />
German flank under accurate and pun-<br />
ishing fire at the first light of day, in-<br />
terdicting all reinforcement by the heavy<br />
weapons needed to reduce the village.<br />
On the whole the situation in the 423d<br />
sector seemed satisfactory, although two<br />
items remained for a final accounting.<br />
The southern flank of the regiment now<br />
w<strong>as</strong> in the air, and its 2d Battalion, <strong>as</strong><br />
division reserve, had been sent forward<br />
to aid the endangered 422d Infantry on<br />
the north.<br />
High on the center of the Schnee<br />
Eifel the 422d Infantry missed the<br />
first rude shock of a predawn attack.<br />
Although it w<strong>as</strong> no part of the German<br />
plan to engage the 422d by frontal <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault, the enemy penetration between<br />
Roth and Weckerath, during the dark<br />
hours, quickly brought the <strong>as</strong>sault troops<br />
of the 294th Regiment down the road<br />
to Auw and onto the American regi-<br />
ment’s flank and rear. Company A of<br />
the 81st Engineer Combat Battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
billeted at Auw, and despite the enemy<br />
shelling in the early morning the engi-<br />
neers had turned out <strong>as</strong> usual to work<br />
on the roads. As the enemy approached<br />
Auw the bulk of the company hurried<br />
back to the village, set up their machine<br />
guns, and engaged the German column.<br />
This column (at le<strong>as</strong>t a battalion of the<br />
294th) w<strong>as</strong> reinforced by self-propelled<br />
guns, which shelled the engineers out of<br />
their positions. When the 1st Platoon,<br />
the l<strong>as</strong>t to leave, finally essayed a d<strong>as</strong>h<br />
from the village to the protection of a<br />
nearby wood lot, Cpl. Edward S. Withee<br />
remained behind to cover his comrades,<br />
with only his submachine gun <strong>as</strong> a<br />
weapon against the enemy armor. 6 By<br />
this time the American batteries south-<br />
west of the village were bl<strong>as</strong>ting the<br />
Germans t<strong>here</strong>, for a time halting fur-<br />
ther advance. At daylight small groups<br />
began pressure against the forward bat-<br />
talions of the 422d, but this seems to<br />
have been no more than an attempt to<br />
fix American attention to the front.<br />
Company L, however, had to be rushed<br />
to the defense of the regimental com-<br />
mand post at Schlausenbach.<br />
About noon the enemy in Auw be-<br />
came active, moving south against the<br />
artillery groupment composed of the<br />
589th Field Artillery Battalion (<strong>as</strong>tride<br />
the Auw-Bleialf road) and the 592d, a<br />
6 Withee w<strong>as</strong> captured after his lone fight. He<br />
w<strong>as</strong> given the DSC.
156 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
155-mm. howitzer battalion, close by.<br />
The German 294th w<strong>as</strong> acting under<br />
orders to clear the way into the Our val-<br />
ley, but to do so it had to neutralize or<br />
destroy the American artillery, whose<br />
positions had been plotted earlier by the<br />
corps observation battalion. Stealing for-<br />
ward by squads and platoons, the gren-<br />
adiers brought the battery positions<br />
under crossfire from their machine pistols<br />
while mortar crews and gunners worked<br />
to knock out the American field pieces.<br />
Colonel Descheneaux, intent on e<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ing the incre<strong>as</strong>ing pressure, dispatched<br />
a t<strong>as</strong>k force about 1300 to recapture<br />
Auw and cut off the enemy to the south.<br />
This counterattack, employing Company<br />
L, the cannon company, and part of<br />
the antitank company, w<strong>as</strong> b<strong>as</strong>ed on a<br />
plan taken over from the 2d Infantry<br />
Division. The t<strong>as</strong>k force started its ad-<br />
vance in the midst of a sudden snow-<br />
storm, made contact with the Germans<br />
near Auw, then suddenly received or-<br />
ders to return to the regimental com-<br />
mand post at Schlausenbach, which w<strong>as</strong><br />
now threatened by infantry advancing<br />
along the draw from the e<strong>as</strong>t. Even while<br />
the t<strong>as</strong>k force w<strong>as</strong> approaching Auw<br />
the enemy had stepped up the drive to<br />
overrun the artillery, sending <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns in to do the job. But the Ameri-<br />
can cannoneers stayed with their how-<br />
itzers, firing with the shortest fuze<br />
possible, while others of the artillery<br />
worked their way to within bazooka<br />
range of enemy <strong>as</strong>sault guns. The attack<br />
w<strong>as</strong> stopped, after three <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
had been knocked out. The Germans<br />
returned to the softening-up process and<br />
waited for night to fall; artillery and<br />
mortar fire accounted for 36 men in Bat-<br />
tery A of the 592d in the late afternoon.<br />
When day closed, the attempt to de-<br />
stroy the artillery w<strong>as</strong> resumed, flares<br />
and searchlights marking the German<br />
movements. Earlier, General Jones had<br />
taken steps to block the gap between<br />
the 14th Cavalry Group and the 422d,<br />
ordering his reserve, the 2d Battalion,<br />
423d Infantry (Lt. Col. Joseph F. Puett),<br />
to move through St. Vith to Schönberg.<br />
By 1730 Puett’s battalion had detrucked<br />
and set up defenses to cover the road<br />
net at the latter point. Three hours<br />
later General Jones telephoned Colonel<br />
Puett, ordering an immediate attack to<br />
cover the open left flank of the 422d<br />
and permit the two hard-pressed artil-<br />
lery battalions to displace southward.<br />
Apparently General Jones intended that<br />
the battalion should turn north to And-<br />
ler and push <strong>as</strong>ide the enemy along<br />
the Auw-Andler-Schönberg road. Puett,<br />
however, got on the wrong road and<br />
turned south–leaving the northern ap-<br />
proach to Schönberg open. (About the<br />
same time, the cavalry troop at Andler<br />
pulled out.) Ultimately the 2d Battal-<br />
ion found its way through the dark across<br />
country and reached the 589th Field<br />
Artillery Battalion. Meanwhile the<br />
422d commander had swung his left<br />
battalion (the 2d) around to face north,<br />
expecting to link up with the reserve<br />
battalion.<br />
This, then, w<strong>as</strong> the situation. The<br />
106th Division had lost relatively little<br />
ground during the daylight hours of the<br />
16th. Still, the enemy had succeeded in<br />
creating a shallow salient in the Win-<br />
terspelt sector, had penetrated between<br />
the 424th and 423d, and had uncovered<br />
the left flank and rear of the 422d In-<br />
fantry. Through the night of 16–17<br />
December, t<strong>here</strong>fore, the German LXVI<br />
Corps continued to push its tired infan-<br />
try into these sectors, while fresh troops
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 157<br />
moved up with heavy weapons and<br />
motor vehicles for commitment on the<br />
morrow. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no longer any doubt<br />
<strong>as</strong> to the German maneuver. The intelligence<br />
section of the 106th Division<br />
staff analyzed the enemy plan correctly<br />
in its report on the night of 16 December.<br />
“The enemy is capable of pinching<br />
off the Schnee Eifel area by employing<br />
one VG Division plus armor from<br />
the 14th Cavalry Group sector and one<br />
VG Division plus armor from the 423d<br />
Infantry sector at any time.” This estimate<br />
hardly is vitiated by the fact that<br />
only one German division, the 18th<br />
Volks Grenadier, formed the pincers<br />
poised to grip the 106th Division. After<br />
all, the entire 62d Volks Grenadier Division<br />
stood poised to break through in<br />
the Winterspelt area and to strengthen<br />
or lengthen the southern jaw of the<br />
pincers.<br />
General Lucht, leading the LXVI<br />
Corps, could look with some complacency<br />
at the events of this first day, even<br />
though his left wing had failed to break<br />
through the American main line of resistance.<br />
Not a single one of the much<br />
feared Jabo’s had appeared in the sky,<br />
the superior weight of metal available<br />
to the American artillery had not been<br />
utilized in the early and crucial hours<br />
of the <strong>as</strong>sault, and the defenders on the<br />
Schnee Eifel had made not a single<br />
move to threaten the weak and grossly<br />
extended center of the 18th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division. This inactivity by the<br />
106th Division on the first day, combined<br />
with the failure to counterattack<br />
against the weak center on the<br />
Schnee Eifel or the flanks of the German<br />
salients, w<strong>as</strong> inexplicable to the<br />
German commanders but also a matter<br />
Americans would counterattack on 17<br />
December but that their reaction would<br />
come too late and the encirclements<br />
would be completed according to plan.<br />
His own plans for the second day were<br />
simple. On the right the mobile battal-<br />
ion of the 18th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> already moving on Andler en route<br />
to seize the Schonberg bridge and the<br />
road to St. Vith. The left kampfgruppe<br />
of the 18th also would make way for a<br />
mobile thrust. Finally, the 62d Volks<br />
Grenadier Division had orders to break<br />
loose at Heckhuscheid and drive for the<br />
Our valley “at all costs.”<br />
By the night of 16 December Gen-<br />
eral Jones had committed all the re-<br />
serves available to the 106th Division<br />
except a battalion of engineers at St.<br />
Vith. But reinforcements, h<strong>as</strong>tily gath-<br />
ered by the VIII Corps, First <strong>Army</strong>, and<br />
12th <strong>Army</strong> Group, were on the way.<br />
When the 2d Infantry Division turned<br />
over its area to the 106th it had taken<br />
its armored support, Combat Command<br />
B, 9th Armored Division, north to the<br />
V Corps sector. Replacement w<strong>as</strong> made<br />
by the 9th Armored’s Combat Com-<br />
mand R, which <strong>as</strong>sembled at Trois Vier-<br />
ges–some twenty road miles south of<br />
St. Vith–in position to reinforce the<br />
106th if need should arise. This small<br />
armored group represented the only mo-<br />
bile counterattack force available in the<br />
VIII Corps. The extent of the German<br />
threat on 16 December, slowly compre-<br />
hended though it w<strong>as</strong>, obviously re-<br />
quired more dr<strong>as</strong>tic counterme<strong>as</strong>ures<br />
than the limited resources of the VIII<br />
Corps could provide. At 1025, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
the First <strong>Army</strong> rele<strong>as</strong>ed CCB, 9th Ar-<br />
mored, to the VIII Corps, thus per-<br />
mitting Middleton to move his armored<br />
of relief. Lucht anticipated that the reserve (CCR) <strong>as</strong> a backstop for the 28th
158 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Division. CCB, 9th Armored (Brig. Gen.<br />
William M. Hoge), w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembled<br />
around Faymonville, about 12 miles<br />
north of St. Vith, awaiting orders to re-<br />
inforce the 2d Infantry Division attack<br />
toward the Roer River dams.<br />
The attachment of CCB to the 106th<br />
Division, <strong>as</strong> ordered by Middleton, w<strong>as</strong><br />
logical; Hoge’s troops would be return-<br />
ing to old and familiar terrain. During<br />
the day CCB remained at Faymonville<br />
“attached in place,” <strong>as</strong> the military<br />
verbalism runs. The 106th Division com-<br />
mander could not move CCB without<br />
corps approval and w<strong>as</strong> not too con-<br />
cerned with the enemy advance in his<br />
northern sector. He made no move to put<br />
CCB on the road, merely ordering a<br />
platoon of its tank destroyers to St. Vith.<br />
Shortly after dark General Hoge and his<br />
staff arrived at St. Vith to confer with<br />
General Jones. T<strong>here</strong> a plan w<strong>as</strong> made<br />
for CCB to counterattack and retake<br />
Schonberg. This plan shortly w<strong>as</strong> dis-<br />
carded for during the evening the corps<br />
commander telephoned Jones that he<br />
now could have additional armored<br />
help, that CCB, 7th Armored Division,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> on its way from the Ninth <strong>Army</strong> and<br />
would reach St. Vith by 0700 the next<br />
morning.<br />
As events would show, this estimate<br />
of the 7th Armored combat command’s<br />
availability w<strong>as</strong> far too sanguine. Why<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> made is not clear. Lt. Col.<br />
W. M. Slayden of the VIII Corps staff<br />
w<strong>as</strong> with General Jones at the time of<br />
this call. He later said that he should<br />
have warned Jones that the corps com-<br />
mander w<strong>as</strong> “over optimistic” because<br />
he knew that the combat command<br />
w<strong>as</strong> so far distant. In any c<strong>as</strong>e, Jones<br />
decided at midnight that the 7th Ar-<br />
mored combat command should make<br />
the counterattack on the north flank<br />
and that Hoge’s command should march<br />
at once to a position near Steinebrück,<br />
t<strong>here</strong> ready to attack toward Winterspelt<br />
w<strong>here</strong> incoming reports showed a rap-<br />
idly deteriorating situation. It would<br />
appear that this decision to employ<br />
CCB, 9th Armored, on the south flank<br />
reflected either General Middleton’s in-<br />
tention to restore the connection be-<br />
tween the 106th and 28th Divisions or<br />
a direct order from the corps to that<br />
effect. Also, the corps commander did<br />
not want to p<strong>as</strong>s both armored com-<br />
mands through St. Vith. Subsequently,<br />
however, both commands did move<br />
through the city.<br />
The 424th Infantry and CCB,<br />
9th Armored<br />
On the morning of 17 December<br />
the precarious situation of the 424th In-<br />
fantry gave Colonel Reid re<strong>as</strong>on to fear<br />
encirclement. His extended left flank<br />
w<strong>as</strong> in the air. Because communications<br />
had failed, Reid did not know that his<br />
right flank w<strong>as</strong> still covered by the<br />
112th Infantry. In any c<strong>as</strong>e, the enemy<br />
in this sector had brought up tanks<br />
and w<strong>as</strong> attacking in considerable force.<br />
The 424th had its back to the Our Riv-<br />
er and if the enemy seized the bridge<br />
at Steinebrück and spread along the<br />
far bank it would be hard put to with-<br />
draw westward. Communications with<br />
the division command post at St. Vith<br />
w<strong>as</strong> limited to the exchange of liaison<br />
officers traveling along a road now be-<br />
ing shelled by the German guns.<br />
Through the early, dark hours of the<br />
17th the enemy laid mortar and artil-<br />
lery fire on the front-line positions of<br />
the 424th. Opposite the right battalion,
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL<br />
which thus far had held its ground, Ger-<br />
man patrols wormed forward to cut the<br />
barbed wire and lob hand grenades to-<br />
ward the American foxholes. An hour or<br />
so before dawn the German searchlights<br />
flickered on, followed by a storm of<br />
shells from guns and Werfers. The fus-<br />
illade actually w<strong>as</strong> directed against the<br />
juncture between the 424th and 112th,<br />
but Company G, 424th, came under<br />
this fire and suffered many dead <strong>as</strong> day<br />
came and the pounding continued. The<br />
main German thrust, however, w<strong>as</strong> made<br />
farther north, at Winterspelt. A com-<br />
pany or more of the 62d Volks Grenadier<br />
Division had taken possession of the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern half of the village during the<br />
night and at daybreak reinforcements<br />
finally drove the 1st Battalion from<br />
Winters pelt .<br />
Even so, the 424th still blocked the<br />
road to the Our River and Steinebrück.<br />
<strong>To</strong> speed up the attack, the German<br />
corps commander, General Lucht, him-<br />
self hurried to Winterspelt to get the<br />
62d moving toward the Our. Ap-<br />
parently the 62d had become somewhat<br />
disorganized, its losses had been high,<br />
and its left regiment had made little<br />
headway in the Heckhuscheid sector.<br />
Furthermore, the division on its left,<br />
which had been pushing toward the<br />
south flank of the 424th, now pulled<br />
out and left the 62d to go it alone, seri-<br />
ously hampering Lucht’s ability to<br />
exploit the dent hammered into the<br />
American lines at Winterspelt. But the<br />
right regiment of the 62d advanced al-<br />
most unopposed north of Winterspelt<br />
while the division center, now composed<br />
of the 2d Battalion, 164th Regiment,<br />
reinforced by <strong>as</strong>sault guns and engineers,<br />
continued beyond Winterspelt to occupy<br />
the saddle which overlooked the ap-<br />
159<br />
proaches to Steinebrück. The left wing<br />
of the 424th w<strong>as</strong> pushed out of the way,<br />
folding back toward the south and west,<br />
but finally w<strong>as</strong> pegged down by a scratch<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force led by 1st Lt. Jarrett M. Hud-<br />
dleston, Jr. <strong>To</strong> hold this flank and ex-<br />
tend it <strong>as</strong> the enemy moved into the gap,<br />
Colonel Reid kept adding whatever<br />
troops he could find to this junior offi-<br />
cer’s command. Steinebruck bridge re-<br />
mained in American hands.<br />
General Hoge’s CCB, 9th Armored<br />
Division, diverted to the Winterspelt<br />
area on the night of the 16th, arrived in<br />
St. Vith before dawn on the 17th and<br />
received its final orders. The armored<br />
infantry (27th Armored Infantry Bat-<br />
talion) would move at once to seize<br />
the series of hills near Winterspelt; the<br />
tanks (14th Tank Battalion) would <strong>as</strong>-<br />
semble west of the Our River and<br />
thence be committed <strong>as</strong> the situation<br />
unrolled. About this time the 106th<br />
Division commander borrowed a platoon<br />
of the 811th Tank Destroyer Battalion<br />
from CCB, sending it to Schonberg to<br />
relieve the forward command post of the<br />
106th (the platoon did reach the 423d<br />
Infantry). The situation in front of St.<br />
Vith w<strong>as</strong> changing so rapidly that a pla-<br />
toon of the reconnaissance troop leading<br />
CCB had to be sent to defend the road<br />
out of St. Vith to the e<strong>as</strong>t, while a com-<br />
pany of tanks and another of tank de-<br />
stroyers were diverted to screen the<br />
entry of the 7th Armored Division.<br />
Word that Winterspelt w<strong>as</strong> no longer<br />
in friendly hands reached CCB just <strong>as</strong><br />
its two leading rifle companies started<br />
moving to the Our. By 0930 one com-<br />
pany w<strong>as</strong> across the river and had run<br />
into German infantry dug in along the<br />
high ground overlooking the village of<br />
Elcherath, fifteen hundred yards from
160<br />
Steinebrück. The terrain and general<br />
uncertainty <strong>as</strong> to the enemy strength<br />
and dispositions dictated a co-ordinated<br />
attack. By noon the 16th Armored Field<br />
Artillery Battalion w<strong>as</strong> in position west<br />
of the river to support the attack. At<br />
this time General Hoge had in hand<br />
three companies of armored infantry<br />
and the 14th Tank Battalion, a force<br />
deemed sufficient to drive the Germans<br />
back from Elcherath. But the enemy<br />
also w<strong>as</strong> bringing up reinforcements, for<br />
at noon an American spotter plane re-<br />
ported a column of vehicles entering<br />
Winterspelt (perhaps this w<strong>as</strong> the 2d<br />
Battalion of the 164th Regiment).<br />
Two companies of the 27th Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion (Lt. Col. George W.<br />
Seeley) advanced to clear the hills flank-<br />
ing Elcherath while Company B moved<br />
along the main road. Threshed by<br />
small arms fire from the grenadiers on<br />
the wooded slopes Company B suffered<br />
about forty c<strong>as</strong>ualties, but the surprise<br />
appearance of a tank platoon shook the<br />
enemy infantry somewhat. About ninety<br />
Germans, hands high, came forward to<br />
surrender. A little after 1500 General<br />
Hoge ordered his infantry to halt and<br />
dig in; he had decided to throw in the<br />
less vulnerable tank battalion and<br />
thrust for the high ground e<strong>as</strong>t of Win-<br />
terspelt. The 14th Tank Battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
on its way to the Steinebrück bridge<br />
when the <strong>as</strong>sistant division commander<br />
of the 106th arrived with word from<br />
General Jones that Hoge might make<br />
the attack if he wished, but that CCB<br />
must withdraw behind the Our that<br />
night. Since t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little or no point<br />
to further effort in the direction of Win-<br />
terspelt, Hoge told his infantry to dig<br />
in and wait for nightfall, then with-<br />
drew the tanks to their <strong>as</strong>sembly area.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
In the early afternoon Colonel Reid<br />
had gat<strong>here</strong>d the staff of the 424th to<br />
review the regimental position. Nothing<br />
w<strong>as</strong> known of friendly units to the right<br />
and left; no information w<strong>as</strong> getting<br />
through from the division headquar-<br />
ters; the enemy appeared to be work-<br />
ing his way around the left flank of the<br />
424th and had penetrated into the regi-<br />
mental service area. If a withdrawal w<strong>as</strong><br />
to be made starting in the early evening,<br />
preparations would have to begin at<br />
once. Reid decided to hold w<strong>here</strong> he w<strong>as</strong><br />
for he had no orders rele<strong>as</strong>ing his regi-<br />
ment from the “hold at all costs” mis-<br />
sion. Finally, at 1730, the regimental<br />
liaison officer arrived with orders from<br />
Jones that the 424th should withdraw<br />
immediately. During the night of 17–18<br />
December both CCB, 9th Armored,<br />
and the 424th Infantry made a success-<br />
ful move across the river, although in<br />
the hurried withdrawal the latter w<strong>as</strong><br />
forced to leave much equipment be-<br />
hind. The line now occupied by these<br />
two units stretched a distance of seven<br />
thousand yards, from Weppler (north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Steinebrück) south to Burg Reu-<br />
land.<br />
The intervention of the 9th Armored<br />
combat command had not achieved<br />
the results which had been hoped for,<br />
but had contributed indirectly to the<br />
successful withdrawal of the 424th In-<br />
fantry and had delayed the drive by<br />
the 62d Volks Grenadier Division toward<br />
the Our crossings–and St. Vith. The<br />
German division commander later<br />
wrote of the “serious crisis” caused by<br />
the American counterattacks around El-<br />
cherath. The heavy concentration of<br />
American artillery supporting CCB al-<br />
so gave the Germans pause. It seems<br />
probable that the failure of the 183d
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 161<br />
Regiment to make any headway<br />
against the American right wing in the<br />
Heckhuscheid sector on 16 and 17 De-<br />
cember w<strong>as</strong> largely caused by the sharp<br />
tactics in progressive displacement and<br />
the excellent defensive fires of the 591st<br />
Field Artillery Battalion (Lt. Col.<br />
Phillip F. Hoover) and its reinforcing<br />
battalions from the corps artillery. The<br />
8-inch howitzers of the 578th Field Ar-<br />
tillery Battalion, for example, fired 108<br />
tons of shells between the beginning of<br />
the German attack and 1030 on 17 De-<br />
cember against the enemy attack posi-<br />
tions opposite the 424th Infantry. But<br />
only in the Heckhuscheid-Winterspelt<br />
sector had the prearranged and sizable<br />
groupment of VIII Corps artillery be-<br />
hind the corps left wing played any de-<br />
cisive role on 16 and 17 December.<br />
Cannae in the Schnee Eifel<br />
During a telephone conversation ear-<br />
ly in the evening of 16 December the<br />
corps commander had apprised Gen-<br />
eral Jones of his concern over the se-<br />
curity of the 422d and 423d Regiments.<br />
General Middleton stressed the impor-<br />
tance of retaining the Schnee Eifel posi-<br />
tion but told Jones that it w<strong>as</strong> unten-<br />
able unless the north flank could be<br />
“heavily protected.” Later, when re-<br />
ports coming into the corps headquar-<br />
ters at B<strong>as</strong>togne indicated that enemy<br />
pressure along the corps front w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
only continuing but incre<strong>as</strong>ing, Middle-<br />
ton got a call from Jones in which the<br />
106th commander made a tentative sug-<br />
gestion to pull the two regiments back<br />
to less exposed positions. Middleton<br />
answered in the sense of the time-hon-<br />
ored <strong>Army</strong> rule of decision by “the man<br />
on the ground” and left the phone ex-<br />
pecting Jones to withdraw. 7 Perhaps<br />
General Jones’s opinion w<strong>as</strong> altered by<br />
the knowledge that armored support<br />
w<strong>as</strong> on its way, perhaps by the VIII Corps<br />
order, received somewhat later, that no<br />
troops were to be withdrawn unless<br />
their positions became completely un-<br />
tenable. (However, the “hold at all<br />
costs” line drawn to accompany this or-<br />
der w<strong>as</strong> fixed <strong>as</strong> the west bank of the<br />
Our and all nine rifle battalions of the<br />
106th Division were e<strong>as</strong>t of that river.)<br />
Perhaps Jones felt that the corps com-<br />
mander w<strong>as</strong> p<strong>as</strong>sing the buck and would<br />
leave him in the lurch if a withdrawal<br />
order w<strong>as</strong> issued. In any c<strong>as</strong>e Jones de-<br />
cided not to withdraw the two regi-<br />
ments.<br />
The fateful day for the 106th Division<br />
would be 17 December. On both sides<br />
of the battle line reinforcements were<br />
moving, the Germans to close the trap<br />
on the Schnee Eifel troops, the Amer-<br />
icans to wedge its jaws apart. The bat-<br />
tle had continued all through the night<br />
of 16–17 December, with results whose<br />
impact would be fully appreciated only<br />
after daylight on the 17th.<br />
Colonel Devine, the 14th Cavalry<br />
group commander, left the 106th Divi-<br />
sion command post about 0800 on the<br />
morning of 17 December, still, insofar <strong>as</strong><br />
it can be <strong>as</strong>certained, without instruc-<br />
tions. The previous evening V Corps had<br />
<strong>as</strong>ked VIII Corps to re-establish contact<br />
between the 99th Division and the 14th<br />
Cavalry. This call had been routed to<br />
Colonel Devine, at St. Vith, who spoke<br />
on the phone to the 99th Division head-<br />
quarters and agreed to regain contact at<br />
Wereth. The conversation took place<br />
7 Combat Interv with Middleton and Evans;<br />
also Ltr, Middleton to Theater Historian ETO,<br />
30 Jul 45.
162 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
about 2130. But in the ensuing hours<br />
the situation of Devine’s command had<br />
altered radically.<br />
It will be recalled that the 14th Cav-<br />
alry Group had withdrawn to the Holz-<br />
heim-Andler line, breaking contact with<br />
the enemy. About 1830 on 16 December<br />
the units of the 18th Reconnaissance<br />
Squadron which had moved to Holzheim<br />
on the lefts of the line withdrew to<br />
Wereth, farther west, with the consent<br />
of the group commander. This move<br />
left Troop A of the 32d by itself at<br />
Holzheim. The troop commander w<strong>as</strong><br />
concerned with his exposed left flank<br />
and requested permission to move to<br />
Honsfeld, in the 99th Division zone,<br />
somewhat over two miles to the north.<br />
Group headquarters w<strong>as</strong> loath to ap-<br />
prove such a move and <strong>as</strong>ked for a report<br />
by liaison officer. Finally the commander<br />
of Troop A decided to act on his own<br />
initiative; the troop reached Honsfeld<br />
at 2100 and w<strong>as</strong> incorporated in the<br />
defense of that village. Its subsequent<br />
story belongs with that of the 99th<br />
Division.<br />
During the evening German troops<br />
had been reported on the road south<br />
of Holzheim. The executive officer of<br />
the 32d Squadron received this report<br />
at Herresbach, w<strong>here</strong> the squadron<br />
headquarters and Troops E and C were<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembled. Although no Germans had<br />
yet appeared, the executive officer w<strong>as</strong><br />
apprehensive lest Herresbach become a<br />
cul-de-sac. The road southe<strong>as</strong>t to Andler<br />
might be ambushed. The poor secondary<br />
road northwest to Wereth w<strong>as</strong> blocked<br />
by fallen trees, probably felled by the<br />
Belgians. Reconnaissance showed one<br />
way out of the village, a poor dirt trail,<br />
which led westward for about four miles<br />
and t<strong>here</strong> joined a fairly good road. It<br />
w<strong>as</strong> decided that this trail would be used<br />
if the elements in Herresbach had to<br />
withdraw any farther.<br />
As a result of the reshuffling during<br />
the night the cavalry position extended<br />
obliquely southe<strong>as</strong>t from Wereth<br />
through Herresbach to Andler. Troop<br />
B at Andler, then, lay close to the enemy,<br />
directly <strong>as</strong>tride the main approach to<br />
Schonberg and St. Vith. At daybreak<br />
two of the troop’s reconnaissance teams<br />
-about twenty men–were suddenly en-<br />
gulfed by Tiger tanks and infantry.<br />
‘This apparition w<strong>as</strong> the 506th Panzer<br />
Battalion which had been thrown in by<br />
the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> to reinforce its<br />
advance toward Vielsalm, and which had<br />
detoured south of the interarmy bound-<br />
ary in search of a p<strong>as</strong>sable road. Con-<br />
tact w<strong>as</strong> momentary. Troop B h<strong>as</strong>tily<br />
withdrew south to Schonberg while the<br />
Tigers went lumbering off to the<br />
northwest. Now that Andler w<strong>as</strong> in en-<br />
emy hands the 32d Cavalry Squadron at<br />
Herresbach w<strong>as</strong> isolated. The squadron<br />
executive officer requested permission to<br />
withdraw via the woods trail, which had<br />
been surveyed earlier, and the 14th Cav-<br />
alry Group commander–who had ar-<br />
rived at his command post in Meyerode<br />
-gave consent. About 0830 the 32d<br />
Squadron and the numerous strays and<br />
stragglers who had congregated in Her-<br />
resbach began the difficult move. All ve-<br />
hicles finally emerged from the woods<br />
and joined group headquarters at Meye-<br />
rode.<br />
Thus far only Troop B had actually<br />
seen and engaged the Germans. Troop<br />
B w<strong>as</strong> hit again at Schonberg, this time<br />
by elements of the 294th Regiment led<br />
in person by the 18th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division commander, and headed west<br />
along the St. Vith road, looking for a
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 163<br />
defile or cut which would afford an<br />
effective delaying position. The aban-<br />
donment of Schonberg proved to be<br />
decisive. The northern kampfgruppe<br />
of the 18th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
would shortly be joined by the south-<br />
ern, which had just broken through the<br />
American lines at Bleialf, thus closing<br />
the trap on the American forces within<br />
the triangle Auw-Schönberg-Bleialf.<br />
Troop B finally reached a favorable<br />
point at a sharp bend in the road near<br />
Heuem, about 2,000 yards west of Schön-<br />
berg. Here, while other American troops<br />
streamed through from the e<strong>as</strong>t, the<br />
cavalry deployed its six armored cars and<br />
ten machine gun and mortar jeeps. When<br />
the first German vehicle, a tank or <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault gun, rounded the bend two of the<br />
armored cars opened up with 37-mm.<br />
guns which did no damage but induced<br />
it to withdraw. Then, for nearly two<br />
hours, the troopers’ light machine guns<br />
and mortars repelled every attempt that<br />
the advance guard of the 294th made to<br />
move forward. Finally at 1050 the 14th<br />
Cavalry Group sent radio orders for<br />
Troop B to withdraw through St. Vith<br />
and rejoin the 32d Squadron northe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of that city. This move w<strong>as</strong> part of a<br />
general withdrawal which Colonel De-<br />
vine had ordered on his own initiative<br />
after scouts sent out by the 18th Squad-<br />
ron at Wereth reported seeing German<br />
troops to the west (probably the advance<br />
guard of the 3d Parachute Division<br />
moving in the direction of Malmédy) .<br />
By noontime, or shortly t<strong>here</strong>after,<br />
the 32d Squadron w<strong>as</strong> in position at<br />
Wallerode and the 18th Squadron w<strong>as</strong><br />
on the high ground at Born, northwest of<br />
Wallerode. On the whole this repre-<br />
sented a favorable defensive line and<br />
placed the group in position to block the<br />
main road from Büllingen in the north<br />
to St. Vith. Colonel Devine informed the<br />
headquarters at St. Vith that he had<br />
withdrawn to a “final delaying position,”<br />
and sent an overlay to the 106th com-<br />
mand post showing the new position.<br />
Furthermore, Devine advised that he<br />
would “have [a] counterattack force<br />
available your orders.” It seems that<br />
General Jones did not question this<br />
latest retrograde movement, for it w<strong>as</strong><br />
reported to the VIII Corps forthwith<br />
and without comment. At 1220 the G–3<br />
journal of the 106th Division records a<br />
telephone message from the 14th Cav-<br />
alry Group <strong>as</strong>king for “the general plan”<br />
(this w<strong>as</strong> an hour after the withdrawal<br />
message arrived at St. Vith) . The reply<br />
w<strong>as</strong> “stay on the line w<strong>here</strong> you are. Ln<br />
O coming to you.”<br />
Although the 106th Division had not<br />
ordered the group to withdraw in the<br />
first instance to the Wallerode-Born posi-<br />
tion, a cavalry screen in this area would<br />
be very useful <strong>as</strong> outpost cover for the<br />
7th Armored Division elements still<br />
moving south to St. Vith. Certainly a<br />
roadblock <strong>here</strong> to the north of the city<br />
w<strong>as</strong> essential.<br />
But once more the group commander<br />
gave the order to withdraw, this about<br />
1530. T<strong>here</strong> never h<strong>as</strong> been a clear<br />
explanation for this order; the group had<br />
no contact with the enemy and had re-<br />
ported the Wallerode-Born line <strong>as</strong> a<br />
“final delaying position.” A liaison offi-<br />
cer from the 106th Division w<strong>as</strong> at the<br />
group command post, but it is impossible<br />
to say whether Colonel Devine received<br />
any definite order to hold this position.<br />
Liaison officers carried the new orders to<br />
the two squadrons: the 18th to occupy<br />
the village of Recht and the 32d to de-<br />
ploy along the Recht River <strong>as</strong>tride the
164<br />
St. Vith-Vielsalm road. Again t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
confusion, either in the orders issued or<br />
their execution. Instead of moving back<br />
by separate roads both squadrons moved<br />
onto the main highway leading west<br />
from St. Vith to Vielsalm. Darkness<br />
found the group caught up in the traffic<br />
jam, three columns wide, crawling slowly<br />
out of or into St. Vith.<br />
Before dawn, on 17 December, the<br />
enemy renewed his attack to envelop the<br />
major part of the 106th Division. At<br />
0725 a radio message from the 423d In-<br />
fantry reported that the Germans had<br />
overrun Bleialf and requested the divi-<br />
sion to send help at once to prevent a<br />
thrust in force to the north. In the 14th<br />
Cavalry Group sector, the enemy w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
Andler and driving toward Schonberg.<br />
Finally, at 0905, the news reached the<br />
106th Division command post in St. Vith<br />
that the enemy forces striking north from<br />
Bleialf had pushed the 423d Infantry<br />
back to the northe<strong>as</strong>t and had joined<br />
hands with the forces at Schonberg. The<br />
German plan of envelopment had suc-<br />
ceeded-the 422d and 423d Regiments<br />
were encircled. The only question re-<br />
maining w<strong>as</strong> whether the two units<br />
could break out or be rele<strong>as</strong>ed by an<br />
American counterthrust from the west.<br />
The answer lies in the state and disposi-<br />
ticns of the trapped regiments.<br />
The 2d Battalion, 423d, committed<br />
the previous evening, had organized a<br />
defensive position <strong>as</strong>tride the Auw-<br />
Bleialf road close behind the belea-<br />
guered 589th Field Artillery Battalion.<br />
Most of the 589th reached the infantry<br />
lines, but Battery C had become mired<br />
in an area which w<strong>as</strong> under<br />
constant fire and toward dawn the<br />
bogged howitzers were destroyed<br />
w<strong>here</strong> they lay. The medium pieces of<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the 592d Field Artillery Battalion had<br />
been less close-pressed by the German<br />
infantry; during the early morning of 17<br />
December the battalion, with only one<br />
howitzer missing, withdrew to St. Vith.<br />
The two remaining batteries of the 589th<br />
were less fortunate. While en route to<br />
St. Vith the column w<strong>as</strong> surprised on the<br />
road about a mile south of Schonberg;<br />
three of the remaining pieces were lost<br />
t<strong>here</strong> (two had been lost at firing posi-<br />
tions). The three howitzers left to the<br />
battalion were emplaced in support of<br />
the h<strong>as</strong>ty defenses being reared around<br />
St. Vith. The 590th Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talion, having moved north from the<br />
423d Infantry zone during the night, also<br />
w<strong>as</strong> en route to the west when suddenly<br />
its escape w<strong>as</strong> blocked by the tanks which<br />
had struck the 589th. Reconnaissance<br />
showed that the other exit routes were<br />
held by the enemy or were mired to the<br />
extent of being imp<strong>as</strong>sable. The bat-<br />
talion t<strong>here</strong>fore rejoined the forces in<br />
the pocket and took up firing positions<br />
in the Halenfelder Wald. This one<br />
battalion of the division artillery<br />
could be of little help, for its service<br />
battery, sent west for ammunition, would<br />
be unable to return.<br />
While the artillery w<strong>as</strong> attempting es-<br />
cape, with varying degrees of success, the<br />
2d Battalion, 423d, repelled two enemy<br />
attempts to advance south of Auw.<br />
Meanwhile patrols had discovered some<br />
German troops at Laudesfeld, about a<br />
thousand yards west of the battalion<br />
positions. The 2d Battalion commander,<br />
now out of contact with the command<br />
post at St. Vith, decided to fall back and<br />
defend Schonberg. When the battalion<br />
finally turned to follow the artillery out<br />
of the trap, it found the way effectively<br />
blocked by German tanks. Although the
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 165<br />
battalion antitank guns did well in the<br />
unequal contest with the panzers–de-<br />
stroying three at one point–neither they<br />
nor the attached platoon of tank de-<br />
stroyers could hope to force the entry to<br />
the Schonberg road. Puett’s battalion<br />
could now move only in one direction-<br />
to the e<strong>as</strong>t. At noontime the 2d Battalion<br />
joined the 423d Infantry near Radscheid.<br />
Communication with the division having<br />
failed, Puett placed himself and his bat-<br />
talion at the disposal of the commander<br />
of the 423d and w<strong>as</strong> ordered into the<br />
perimeter defense slowly forming.<br />
It is probable that both the 423d and<br />
422d were aware of their plight by 0900;<br />
at le<strong>as</strong>t radio reports of the unsuccessful<br />
attempt by the 590th to run the Schon-<br />
berg gantlet had been received. The<br />
106th Division took cognizance of the<br />
situation in which the regiments now<br />
found themselves by a radio order sent<br />
out at 0945: “Withdraw from present<br />
positions if they become untenable.”<br />
The message added that the division ex-<br />
pected to clear out the area “west of you”<br />
with reinforcements during the after-<br />
noon. This communication, unfortu-<br />
nately, w<strong>as</strong> delayed in transit. Actually<br />
neither regiment made any move except<br />
to bring some troops out of the Schnee<br />
Eifel and sketch in perimeter defenses.<br />
The only contact between the 422d and<br />
423d w<strong>as</strong> by radio and patrols. During<br />
the afternoon the enemy constricted<br />
their hold, albeit loosely by deployment<br />
along the Bleialf-Auw road, but on the<br />
whole the Americans were left to their<br />
own devices while German infantry,<br />
guns, and vehicles poured p<strong>as</strong>t on their<br />
way to the west.<br />
The early morning breakthrough in<br />
the Bleialf sector, necessary to the Ger-<br />
man encirclement of the Schnee Eifel<br />
forces, had been accomplished by the<br />
southern jaw of the German vise only<br />
after strong exhortation and admonition<br />
of the 293d Regiment by its parent divi-<br />
sion and corps. At the close of 16 Decem-<br />
ber the provisional battalion of the 423d<br />
Infantry still held Bleialf, from which the<br />
enemy had been ejected earlier in the<br />
day. During the night the 293d Regi-<br />
ment re-formed for the attack, urged on<br />
by its higher headquarters, and at 0530<br />
the next morning struck Bleialf in force.<br />
Within an hour the attackers had driven<br />
the provisional battalion from the vil-<br />
lage (the Germans later reported a stiff<br />
fight) and were on the march north to<br />
Schonberg. Nothing stood in the way, al-<br />
though the enemy vanguard ran into the<br />
American artillery withdrawal and w<strong>as</strong><br />
slightly delayed, and about 0900 the lead-<br />
ing troops of the 293d met their division<br />
commander and his battalion from the<br />
294th near Schonberg.<br />
Most of the Bleialf garrison succeeded<br />
in joining the two rifle battalions of the<br />
423d. But on the extreme right flank of<br />
the regiment, south of Bleialf, elements<br />
of Company B, 8 1st Engineer Battalion,<br />
were overrun and Troop B, 18th Cavalry<br />
Squadron, w<strong>as</strong> left isolated. Unable to<br />
reach the 423d, the troop w<strong>as</strong> given per-<br />
mission to try the Schonberg exit. About<br />
dark Troop B started north, followed by<br />
a part of the 106th Reconnaissance<br />
Troop which had become separated<br />
from the 424th Infantry. Keeping to the<br />
west of the enemy-occupied Bleialf-<br />
Schonberg road, the cavalry column<br />
reached the edge of Schonberg. (By this<br />
time the situation w<strong>as</strong> so confused that<br />
a Volkswagen full of grenadiers moved<br />
into the column just ahead of an armored<br />
car–whose gunner promptly destroyed<br />
the intruding vehicle and its occupants.)
166 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Because Schonberg w<strong>as</strong> known to be<br />
in German hands, the 3d Platoon moved<br />
in to determine the situation. The pla-<br />
toon had crossed the Our bridge and w<strong>as</strong><br />
at the north end of the village when<br />
t<strong>here</strong> appeared a column of American<br />
trucks, but filled with Germans carrying<br />
arms. The three armored cars, forming<br />
the point of the platoon, wheeled over<br />
to the side of the road and raced toward<br />
the head of the column, firing their ma-<br />
chine guns and 37-mm. cannon <strong>as</strong> they<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed the yelling Germans. Suddenly a<br />
Mark IV tank slipped out of a side road.<br />
Only one of the American armored cars<br />
got away. When informed by radio of<br />
this engagement the 423d Infantry in-<br />
structed Troop B to “make your own<br />
decision.” Unsuccessful in finding any<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sable secondary road, the troopers<br />
destroyed their vehicles and broke up<br />
into small groups for the journey toward<br />
St. Vith. Hiding by day and traveling by<br />
night some fifty reached the St. Vith<br />
lines. The 106th Reconnaissance Troop<br />
had become completely disorganized<br />
while following Troop B, and one pla-<br />
toon w<strong>as</strong> left in Grosslangenfeld with<br />
neither orders nor word of the with-<br />
drawal. Most of the officers and men sur-<br />
rendered the next morning without a<br />
fight. 8<br />
When darkness came on 17 December,<br />
some eight or nine thousand Americans<br />
were effectively bottled up west of the<br />
Schnee Eifel. Their story henceforth h<strong>as</strong><br />
little connection with events outside the<br />
pocket. In addition to the 422d and 423d<br />
Infantry Regiments the list of attached<br />
and supporting units that were severed<br />
from the main thread of American op-<br />
8 This according to the F<strong>US</strong>A Inspector General<br />
report.<br />
erations included all or part of the<br />
following:<br />
589th Field Artillery Battalion (-)<br />
590th Field Artillery Battalion<br />
Company B, 81st Engineer Battal-<br />
ion<br />
Battery D, 634th Antiaircraft Auto-<br />
matic Weapons Battalion<br />
Company C, 820th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion<br />
Company B, 331st Medical Battal-<br />
ion<br />
106th Reconnaissance Troop<br />
Troop B, 18th Cavalry Reconnais-<br />
sance Squadron (-)<br />
The 422d Infantry on that night w<strong>as</strong><br />
forming a perimeter defense, its center<br />
south of Schlausenbach. <strong>To</strong> the south-<br />
west the 423d Infantry w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>suming a<br />
similar stance on the high ground around<br />
Oberl<strong>as</strong>cheid and Buchet. At the mo-<br />
ment t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no shortage of rifle<br />
ammunition, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a b<strong>as</strong>ic load for<br />
the mortars (but the 590th Field Artil-<br />
lery Battalion had only about 300 rounds<br />
for its 105-mm. howitzers) , approxi-<br />
mately one day’s extra K rations were at<br />
hand, and surgical supplies were very<br />
short. Most of the regimental vehicles<br />
had been saved–although the service<br />
company of the 422d had been cut off<br />
near Auw and some kitchen trucks had<br />
been lost. C<strong>as</strong>ualties were not high in<br />
either regiment; the 422d, for example,<br />
reported only forty wounded for evacua-<br />
tion.<br />
Both regimental commanders had<br />
been <strong>as</strong>sured by radio that reinforce-<br />
ments from the west would attempt to<br />
break through sometime after daylight<br />
on 18 December and, further, that sup-<br />
plies would be dropped by air. A divi-<br />
sion order to withdraw to the Our River,
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 167<br />
sent out at 1445, w<strong>as</strong> followed six hours<br />
later by the question: “When do you<br />
plan to move?” These orders, relayed<br />
through the artillery radio net, took a<br />
long time and much repetition before<br />
they could reach the entrapped regi-<br />
ments. The initial order to withdraw<br />
to the Our River line w<strong>as</strong> not received<br />
until about midnight of the 17th. The<br />
two regimental commanders agreed that<br />
this order now w<strong>as</strong> out of date because<br />
messages, signed later in the day, had<br />
promised resupply by air.<br />
Late in the evening of the 17th Gen-<br />
eral Jones consulted the VIII Corps<br />
commander and at 0215 the next morn-<br />
ing sent out an order: “Panzer regtl CT<br />
on Elmerscheid 9 –Schonberg–St. Vith<br />
Rd, head near St. Vith. Our mission is to<br />
destroy by fire from dug in positions S<br />
of Schonberg–St. Vith Rd. Am, food and<br />
water will be dropped. When mission<br />
accomplished, move to area St. Vith-<br />
Wallerode-Weppler. Organize and move<br />
to W.” This message reached the 423d<br />
Infantry, which alone had some sporadic<br />
radio link with the division, about 0730;<br />
it reached the 422d Infantry about half<br />
an hour later. The regimental com-<br />
manders decided to begin the move to<br />
the west at 1000, with their regiments<br />
abre<strong>as</strong>t (although the only contact w<strong>as</strong><br />
by patrol) and in column of battalions.<br />
As understood, the mission w<strong>as</strong> to ad-<br />
vance across the Bleialf-Schönberg road<br />
and attack from the south side of the<br />
road between Schonberg and St. Vith,<br />
that is, byp<strong>as</strong>sing Schonberg.<br />
From the time of this joint decision<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little contact between the regi-<br />
ments. The 423d destroyed its kitchens<br />
9 Probably this message referred to the Amel-<br />
scheid “cut-off’ through which the Americans had<br />
been attempting to evade the enemy.<br />
and excess equipment, left the wounded<br />
with medical aid men in the regimental<br />
collecting station, and started off on the<br />
road through Oberl<strong>as</strong>cheid and Radscheid.<br />
10 About 1130 Puett’s 2d Battalion,<br />
leading, met the Germans near the<br />
Schonberg-Bleialf road. With the aid of<br />
its heavy weapons company, whose mortars<br />
did yeoman service, the battalion<br />
began to push the enemy back toward<br />
Bleialf. Meanwhile Colonel Cavender<br />
had gone forward to see what the situation<br />
w<strong>as</strong>, but en route he received a radio<br />
message from General Jones telling him<br />
that the relief attack by the American<br />
armor would not take place and ordering<br />
the two regiments to shift their move to<br />
Schonberg. Cavender p<strong>as</strong>sed word of<br />
this new mission to Colonel Descheneaux<br />
and ordered his own 3d Battalion to<br />
come up on Puett’s right. At noon Puett<br />
sent an urgent plea for help, but none<br />
arrived at this critical point in the fire<br />
fight and the attack finally lost momentum.<br />
The 3d Battalion had advanced<br />
across the Ihren Creek and dug in perhaps<br />
1,000 to 1,500 yards from the edge<br />
of Schonberg, but in doing so lost touch<br />
with both its own regiment and the 422d<br />
Infantry. About dusk the 1st Battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> put in on the left of the 2d to help<br />
clear the German infantry from the<br />
woods <strong>as</strong>tride the Bleialf-Schönberg<br />
road, but the psychological moment had<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed. 11<br />
The l<strong>as</strong>t message from the division<br />
(actually dispatched at 1445 the day before)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> heard an hour or so before<br />
10 Lt. Col. William Craig, commanding officer of<br />
the 1st Battalion, died of wounds on this day.<br />
11 1st Lt. R. H. Thompson personally destroyed<br />
two enemy machine guns and their crews in this<br />
series of actions; he then made a lone attack on<br />
an enemy <strong>as</strong>sault gun and w<strong>as</strong> seriously wounded.<br />
He received the DSC.
168 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
midnight, “It is imperative that Schon-<br />
berg be taken.” Colonel Cavender al-<br />
ready had decided to disengage his two<br />
left battalions, in light of the next mis-<br />
sion, and shift northward to support a<br />
dawn attack by the 3d Battalion. By this<br />
time the 423d w<strong>as</strong> going it alone, for all<br />
attempts to reach the sister regiment had<br />
failed. During the night the regiment<br />
pulled itself together in some semblance<br />
of order along Ridge 536, just southe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Schonberg. Losses had been high-<br />
some 300 c<strong>as</strong>ualties (including 16 offi-<br />
cers). No more rounds were left for the<br />
81-mm. mortars, most of the machine<br />
guns were gone, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little bazooka<br />
ammunition, and rifle clips were low.<br />
The surrounding enemy forces were<br />
surprised that the American regiments<br />
made no move to counterattack during<br />
the night of 18–19 December; one report<br />
says: “In the Kessel absolute quiet<br />
reigned.” The troops actually ringing the<br />
pocket were relatively few: the 293d In-<br />
fantry Regiment, the 18th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division Replacement Battalion<br />
(which had come over the Schnee Eifel) ,<br />
and the newly arrived 669th Ost Battal-<br />
ion. Since the roads at the Schonberg<br />
bottleneck were jammed, the LX VI<br />
Corps commander could bring only one<br />
battalion of field guns that far forward;<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore the corps artillery w<strong>as</strong> in-<br />
structed to concentrate fire on the<br />
pocket during the 19th.<br />
The 423d still w<strong>as</strong> attempting to form<br />
for the attack, when, an hour or so after<br />
dawn on 19 December, German field<br />
pieces along the Bleialf-Schönberg road<br />
opened fire, sweeping the southe<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
slope of Ridge 536. Soon the shelling<br />
ce<strong>as</strong>ed and the enemy infantry closed in,<br />
overrunning the 590th Field Artillery<br />
Battalion and other heterogeneous units<br />
which had been moving in the rear of<br />
the rifle battalions. Despite this blow<br />
Lt. Col. Earl F. Klinck’s 3d Battalion<br />
jumped off in good order at 1000. One<br />
company w<strong>as</strong> cut off and captured, but<br />
two rifle companies reached the environs<br />
of Schonberg, then had to retire in a<br />
storm of antiaircraft fire. The 1st Battal-<br />
ion w<strong>as</strong> able to put one company in the<br />
advance, but by midafternoon it w<strong>as</strong><br />
eliminated. When brought forward on<br />
the right the 2d Battalion became sepa-<br />
rated and w<strong>as</strong> subjected to fire from the<br />
422d Infantry, then about 400 yards to<br />
the north. At l<strong>as</strong>t, with tactical control<br />
gone, only five to ten rifle rounds per<br />
man, no supporting weapons, and an in-<br />
cre<strong>as</strong>ing number of wounded untended<br />
(despite yeoman effort by the regimental<br />
surgeon, Maj. Gaylord D. Fridline, and<br />
his staff), the commander of the 423d<br />
Infantry surrendered his regiment. The<br />
time w<strong>as</strong> about 1630.<br />
The experience of the 422d Infantry<br />
w<strong>as</strong> very similar to that of its sister regi-<br />
ment. Largely quiescent during the 17th,<br />
the 422d acted <strong>as</strong> promptly <strong>as</strong> possible<br />
when the division order w<strong>as</strong> received on<br />
the following morning. Colonel Desche-<br />
neaux, acting in concert with the 423d,<br />
ordered an advance in column of battal-<br />
ions, the axis to the northwest in the<br />
direction of Schonberg. Excess equip-<br />
ment w<strong>as</strong> destroyed, the wounded were<br />
left with an aid man, the regimental can-<br />
non company fired its l<strong>as</strong>t smoke rounds<br />
into Auw (<strong>as</strong> a slight deterrent to enemy<br />
observers), then spiked the pieces. In two<br />
columns–one made up of foot troops<br />
lugging all portable weapons, the other<br />
made up of regimental vehicles–the<br />
movement encountered nothing but<br />
small groups of the enemy. Reconnais-<br />
sance had been confined to the map, al-
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 169<br />
though the I and K Platoon w<strong>as</strong> used<br />
<strong>as</strong> point during the march, and when<br />
the two columns re<strong>as</strong>sembled at dusk the<br />
422d w<strong>as</strong> lost. A wood had been selected<br />
on the map <strong>as</strong> a suitable <strong>as</strong>sembly area<br />
from which to launch a co-ordinated<br />
attack against Schonberg, this about one<br />
and a half miles from the village. In fact,<br />
however, the regiment had bivouacked<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t of Oberl<strong>as</strong>cheid in a wood<br />
about three miles from its objective-<br />
nor apparently w<strong>as</strong> anyone the wiser.<br />
During the early evening the I and R<br />
Platoon reported that contact had been<br />
made with the neighboring regiment,<br />
which intended to attack Schonberg. No<br />
further liaison w<strong>as</strong> made. While gunfire<br />
sounded off to the west and northwest<br />
the rifle battalions marched through the<br />
darkness to three smaller woods, prepara-<br />
tory for an attack at daylight on the 19th.<br />
The dispositions now taken were farther<br />
to the north, facing the Bleialf-Auw<br />
road, with the battalions deployed so that<br />
the 1st Battalion w<strong>as</strong> farthest north, the<br />
2d Battalion in the center, and the 3d<br />
Battalion on the south. At daybreak the<br />
three battalions moved out abre<strong>as</strong>t, ad-<br />
vancing in approach march formation<br />
toward the objective–Schönberg–be–<br />
lieved to be little more than a mile<br />
distant. The leading troops were just<br />
crossing the Bleialf-Auw road when they<br />
were hit by machine gun and tank fire<br />
AMERICAN PRISONERS. The tank is a German Tiger.
170 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
coming from the north. At this point the<br />
road curved to the e<strong>as</strong>t, and the enemy<br />
apparently had taken a position in woods<br />
north of the bend which allowed him to<br />
enfilade the straightway. The 1st Battal-<br />
ion commander ordered his men to turn<br />
back from the road and move southward.<br />
In the meantime the 2d and 3d Battal-<br />
ions had jumped off, but at the road<br />
their lead companies also came under<br />
severe frontal and flanking fire.<br />
It will be recalled that the 422d and<br />
its sister regiment to the south had no<br />
contact. While the right wing battalion<br />
of the 423d w<strong>as</strong> attempting to advance<br />
northwestward, it w<strong>as</strong> discerned by the<br />
left flank troops of the 422d who, mis-<br />
taking this movement for a German<br />
flanking attack, poured bullet fire into<br />
the draw w<strong>here</strong> the men of the 423d<br />
were moving. In the brief exchange of<br />
fire which followed both these inner<br />
flank units became considerably disor-<br />
ganized.<br />
But finally it w<strong>as</strong> fire superiority in<br />
the hands of the enemy which checked<br />
further movement. About 1400, tanks<br />
were heard approaching from the north.<br />
In a l<strong>as</strong>t desperate flare of optimism the<br />
Americans thought that these were<br />
friendly tanks–but they were not. By a<br />
stroke of ill fortune the Fuehrer Begleit<br />
Brigade had been ordered forward to<br />
support the LXVI Corps attack on St.<br />
Vith. En route from Auw to Schonberg,<br />
the panzers arrived at the fork w<strong>here</strong><br />
the road split toward Schonberg and<br />
Bleialf just in time to give the coup-de-<br />
grâce. The tanks rolled through the bat-<br />
talions on the right while the German<br />
infantry poured in from the woods. At<br />
1430 the regimental commander decided<br />
to surrender that part of his regiment<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> disorganized and entrapped.<br />
After negotiations to determine that the<br />
Germans would feed the Americans and<br />
provide care for the wounded, the sur-<br />
render w<strong>as</strong> completed about 1600.<br />
A group of about 400, however, were<br />
reorganized by the 2d Battalion execu-<br />
tive officer (Maj. Albert A. Ouellette)<br />
in the woods which had been the 2d<br />
Battalion <strong>as</strong>sembly area. This group at-<br />
tempted to move southwest the follow-<br />
ing day, but it too w<strong>as</strong> surrounded. After<br />
destroying weapons and equipment Oue-<br />
llette’s people surrendered on the morn-<br />
ing of 21 December. Another band,<br />
representing most of the vehicular col-<br />
umn, had attempted to break out<br />
through Bleialf on the late afternoon of<br />
19 December but w<strong>as</strong> halted by a mine<br />
field at the edge of the village, sur-<br />
rounded, and forced to capitulate. Not<br />
more than 150 men of the 422d Infantry<br />
succeeded in escaping to the American<br />
lines.<br />
The number of officers and men taken<br />
prisoner on the capitulation of the two<br />
regiments and their attached troops can-<br />
not be accurately <strong>as</strong>certained. At le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
seven thousand were lost <strong>here</strong> and the<br />
figure probably is closer to eight or nine<br />
thousand. The amount lost in arms and<br />
equipment, of course, w<strong>as</strong> very substan-<br />
tial. The Schnee Eifel battle, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
represents the most serious reverse suf-<br />
fered by American arms during the<br />
operations of 1944–45 in the European<br />
theater. The Americans would regard<br />
this defeat <strong>as</strong> a blow to Allied prestige.<br />
The Germans would see in this victory,<br />
won without great superiority in num-<br />
bers, a dramatic reaffirmation of the<br />
Schlieffen-Cannae concept.<br />
The fate of the two regiments w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
immediately known to the 106th Divi-<br />
sion and the VIII Corps. The l<strong>as</strong>t mes-
BREAKTHROUGH AT THE SCHNEE EIFEL 171<br />
sage radioed out of the pocket had been<br />
dispatched at 1535 on 18 December,<br />
simply saying that the regiments had<br />
started to comply with the orders for an<br />
attack to the northwest; it w<strong>as</strong> received at<br />
St. Vith on the morning of the 19th. By<br />
the night of the 20th the division must<br />
have given up hope, what with the Ger-<br />
man reinforcements from the e<strong>as</strong>t con-<br />
gregating in front of St. Vith, but one<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t attempt to reach the 423d Infantry<br />
by radio w<strong>as</strong> made two days later.<br />
The Question of Air Resupply<br />
One question mark still dangles over<br />
the fate of the two regiments captured<br />
in the Schnee Eifel. Why were they not<br />
resupplied by airdrop? General Jones<br />
and the two regimental commanders<br />
made their wants known <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> the<br />
17th and evidently had some re<strong>as</strong>on to<br />
believe that ammunition, medical sup-<br />
plies, and other necessities would be<br />
delivered to the encircled regiments be-<br />
fore they essayed the final attempt at<br />
escape. Although most of the processing<br />
involved in handling the 106th Division<br />
requests w<strong>as</strong> by telephone and without<br />
record, two facts are certain: General<br />
Jones did all in his power to secure air<br />
resupply; the weather did permit planes<br />
to fly on 18 December when resupply<br />
w<strong>as</strong> most needed. 12<br />
12 Much effort h<strong>as</strong> been made to trace this story<br />
through the numerous headquarters which were<br />
involved, but t<strong>here</strong> are great gaps in the journal<br />
files. Interviews with officers concerned have only<br />
compounded confusion, yielding bits and pieces of<br />
information, which, lacking in written record,<br />
cannot be put together in sequence. Royce L.<br />
Thompson made an exhaustive search of the rec-<br />
ords and conducted a number of personal inter-<br />
views with officers involved in staffing the 106th<br />
requests. See his Air Supply to Isolated Units:<br />
Ardennes Campaign. OCMH, 1951.<br />
At 1051 on 17 December the com-<br />
mander of the 423d Infantry radioed a<br />
request for an airdrop. Relayed through<br />
the division artillery net, this request<br />
w<strong>as</strong> logged in at the 106th Division head-<br />
quarters at 1500. In the meantime Jones<br />
apparently decided to act on his own and<br />
<strong>as</strong>ked the VIII Corps air officer to ar-<br />
range a resupply mission. The time of<br />
this conversation cannot be fixed, but by<br />
1345 a message w<strong>as</strong> en route from St.<br />
Vith to the 423d Infantry promising a<br />
drop in the vicinity of Buchet “tonight.”<br />
Within a quarter of an hour a second<br />
message w<strong>as</strong> on the air for the 422d. The<br />
VIII Corps air officer (Lt. Col. Josiah T.<br />
<strong>To</strong>wne) meanwhile had relayed Jones’s<br />
request through the IX Fighter Com-<br />
mand to the IX Tactical Air Com-<br />
mand. 13 At this point the chain of events<br />
and the chain of responsibility both be-<br />
come unclear.<br />
The IX Tactical Air Command nor-<br />
mally would have referred the request<br />
to First <strong>Army</strong> for clearance. The report<br />
of the G–4 at the latter headquarters<br />
simply says that on the afternoon of 17<br />
December the plight of the two regi-<br />
ments w<strong>as</strong> made known by telephone<br />
calls and that preparations for supply by<br />
air “were promptly set in motion.” 14<br />
Since carrier planes would have to come<br />
from the United Kingdom it w<strong>as</strong> neces-<br />
sary at some stage to bring CATOR<br />
(Combined Air Transport Operations<br />
Room) at SHAEF into the picture. How<br />
many telephone calls were made before<br />
the First <strong>Army</strong> request reached CATOR<br />
13 Dupuy (St. Vith: Lion in the Way, page<br />
134f.), goes no further than the First <strong>Army</strong> head-<br />
quarters to find a culprit, following in this the<br />
combat interview with Colonel <strong>To</strong>wne, 16 January<br />
1945.<br />
14 First United States <strong>Army</strong>, Report of Opera-<br />
tions, an. 2, G–4 Sec, p. 120f.
172<br />
and how many headquarters were in-<br />
volved cannot be determined.<br />
The IX Troop Carrier Command,<br />
whose planes would fly the mission, got<br />
the word from CATOR sometime dur-<br />
ing the early morning of the 18th with<br />
orders to prepare forty planeloads of<br />
ammunition and medical supplies. The<br />
435th Troop Carrier Group, at Welford,<br />
drew this <strong>as</strong>signment and loaded up with<br />
parapacks and door bundles. Orders<br />
were precise. The group w<strong>as</strong> to fly to the<br />
airfield at Florennes, Belgium, and t<strong>here</strong><br />
be briefed on the mission and meet its<br />
fighter cover. The Welford b<strong>as</strong>e w<strong>as</strong><br />
closing in when-at an unspecified time<br />
-the first serial took off. Nonetheless<br />
twenty-three C–47’s arrived in the air<br />
over Florennes. This field, it is reported,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> “too busy to take care of the 435th<br />
formation,” which w<strong>as</strong> ordered to an-<br />
other field near Liége. The commander<br />
and his wingman landed at Florennes,<br />
however, only to find that t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
information for a briefing, nobody had<br />
the map co-ordinates for the scheduled<br />
drop, and no fighter escort had been<br />
arranged. During this time the 435th had<br />
been diverted again, finally landing at<br />
Dreux in France. Here the planes would<br />
stay until 23 December, their original<br />
mission on-again, off-again daily. Some-<br />
w<strong>here</strong> along the line additional requests<br />
from the 106th Division had swelled the<br />
mission to 138 planeloads and ultimately<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> decided to make this larger drop<br />
with planes from the United Kingdom.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
The entire mission w<strong>as</strong> canceled on 22<br />
December in order to support the 101st<br />
Airborne Division at B<strong>as</strong>togne. 15<br />
Two melancholy facts emerge from<br />
this story: fixed responsibility and coordination<br />
were lacking; supplies prepared<br />
for airdropping had to come from<br />
the United Kingdom, despite the fact<br />
that Allied ground troops were at the<br />
German border. Attempts to prevent a<br />
similar fi<strong>as</strong>co were initiated in a matter<br />
of days, but too late to help the dispirited<br />
Americans marching into German captivity.<br />
On 21 December the 12th <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group issued an order “confirming” the<br />
procedure for airdrops to ground troops.<br />
This of course could be only a palliative<br />
so long <strong>as</strong> air and ground co-ordination<br />
remained in abeyance. A day later the<br />
commanding officer of the Communications<br />
Zone, Lt. Gen. John C. H. Lee,<br />
requested SHAEF to set up stocks of<br />
ready-packed supplies, capable of air<br />
delivery, at airfields strategically located<br />
on the Continent. This proposal w<strong>as</strong><br />
accepted.<br />
Perhaps the co-ordination of separate<br />
services and the proper application of<br />
new military techniques must always be<br />
learned the hard way. If so, the cost is<br />
very dear and the prospect in future<br />
wars depressing.<br />
15 Headquarters, IX Troop Carrier Command,<br />
Operation Repulse, Resupply by Air, Belgium,<br />
December 1944 (January 1945); 435th Troop Car-<br />
rier Group Unit <strong>History</strong>, MS dated 1 January<br />
1945.
CHAPTER VIII<br />
The Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> Attacks<br />
the 28th Infantry Division<br />
The battle plans and tactics of the<br />
Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, more than those of<br />
any other German army that took part<br />
in the Ardennes counteroffensive, bore<br />
the very strong personal imprint of its<br />
commander, General Manteuffel. As a<br />
junior officer in the prewar panzer<br />
troops, Manteuffel had made a mark <strong>as</strong><br />
an armored specialist. His record in<br />
North Africa and Russia, w<strong>here</strong> he<br />
achieved a reputation for energetic<br />
leadership and personal bravery,<br />
brought him to Hitler’s attention and<br />
promotion directly from a division to an<br />
army command. Despite the failure of<br />
his Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> in the Lorraine<br />
campaign against Patton’s Third <strong>Army</strong>,<br />
Manteuffel w<strong>as</strong> listed by Hitler for com-<br />
mand in the Ardennes. His staff, care-<br />
fully selected and personally devoted to<br />
the little general, w<strong>as</strong> probably the best<br />
German staff on the Western Front.<br />
Manteuffel had found himself in al-<br />
most complete disagreement with the<br />
original operations plan handed down by<br />
Jodl in November. He w<strong>as</strong> able to con-<br />
vince the <strong>Army</strong> Group B commander<br />
that a stand should be taken on a number<br />
of tactical points which, in Manteuffel’s<br />
judgment, were essential to success in the<br />
forthcoming attack. In the l<strong>as</strong>t planning<br />
conference held at Hitler’s headquarters,<br />
Model and Manteuffel combined forces<br />
in a forthright appeal that carried the<br />
day on a series of tactical decisions al-<br />
though it failed to sway the Fuehrer<br />
from his strategic decision for the Big<br />
Solution. The Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> com-<br />
mander w<strong>as</strong> bitterly opposed to that part<br />
of the plan which called for a tremen-<br />
dous opening barrage at 0800 and a two-<br />
hour artillery preparation before the<br />
attack jumped off. He argued that the<br />
enemy literally must not be awakened<br />
and that the <strong>as</strong>sault forces should move<br />
forward the moment the guns sounded.<br />
This point w<strong>as</strong> conceded when Hitler<br />
ruled that the artillery fires along the<br />
entire front would begin at 0530. Man-<br />
teuffel also held strongly for infiltration<br />
tactics by small detachments, such <strong>as</strong><br />
were conventionally employed by both<br />
opponents on the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front. Hitler<br />
himself seems to have favored this con-<br />
cept (it is found in the first Fuehrer<br />
operations order), but only in the Fifth<br />
Panzer attack would <strong>as</strong>sault detachments<br />
be found inside the American positions<br />
when the initial barrage opened up.<br />
Manteuffel likewise opposed the con-<br />
cept proposed by Jodl in which the<br />
attack would be carried by two panzer<br />
corps advancing in column. He wanted<br />
an attack on a broad front with both<br />
tank corps in the line at the opening<br />
gun–this point Hitler conceded. View-
174<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
GENERAL VON MANTEUFFEL GENERAL VON LUETTWITZ<br />
ing the ground in front of his right ar-<br />
mored corps <strong>as</strong> especially difficult, Man-<br />
teuffel would give Generaloberst Walter<br />
Krueger’s LVIII Panzer Corps a fairly<br />
narrow front for the initial <strong>as</strong>sault. Be-<br />
lieving that once across the Our River,<br />
his left armored attack force, General<br />
der Panzertruppen Heinrich Freiherr<br />
von Luettwitz’ XLVII Panzer Corps,<br />
would find the going better than on the<br />
right, he <strong>as</strong>signed Luettwitz a rather<br />
wide front. In final form, the LVIII Pan-<br />
zer Corps’ mission w<strong>as</strong> to cross the Our<br />
River on both sides of Ouren, drive west<br />
on the Houffalize axis, and create a<br />
bridgehead over the Meuse River in the<br />
neighborhood of Namur and Andenne.<br />
At the same time the XLVII Panzer<br />
Corps would cross the Our in the vicin-<br />
ity of D<strong>as</strong>burg and Gemünd, push west<br />
via Clerf, seize the vital road center at<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne, form in a deep column echeloned<br />
to the left and rear, then race for<br />
the Meuse River crossings south of Namur.<br />
Manteuffel had two armored formations<br />
in reserve, the Panzer Lehr<br />
Division and the Fuehrer Begleit Brigade.<br />
1 These he intended to throw in behind<br />
the armored corps which made the<br />
first bridgehead at the Our.<br />
Although success or failure would turn<br />
1 The Panzer Lehr Division carried the same<br />
organization <strong>as</strong> other German armored divisions.<br />
Its name reflected the division’s original status <strong>as</strong><br />
a tank training unit. The Fuehrer Begleit Bri-<br />
gade originally had been a special escort battalion<br />
for Hitler. It w<strong>as</strong> expanded. for commitment in<br />
the Ardennes to three panzer grenadier battalions,<br />
a panzer regiment, an artillery battalion, an anti-<br />
aircraft battalion, and lesser units.
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 175<br />
on the operations of the two armored<br />
corps, the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> had been<br />
given a small infantry corps of two divi-<br />
sions to flesh out its right shoulder. This<br />
w<strong>as</strong> General der Artillerie Walther<br />
Lucht’s LXVI Corps. In early planning<br />
t<strong>here</strong> had been some question <strong>as</strong> to<br />
whether the Americans in the Schnee<br />
Eifel should be left to the Fifth or the<br />
Sixth. Unhappy about this thorn in his<br />
side, Manteuffel won the <strong>as</strong>signment of<br />
the Schnee Eifel heights to his army and<br />
personally developed a scheme to<br />
mop up resistance in this sector<br />
at the earliest possible moment.<br />
Despite the general dictum that<br />
defended towns would be byp<strong>as</strong>sed, Man-<br />
teuffel wanted St. Vith <strong>as</strong> a blocking<br />
position and so ordered Lucht to capture<br />
it. Once through St. Vith the LXVI<br />
would follow Krueger to Andenne, but<br />
if things grew rough on the left wing<br />
Manteuffel intended to switch Lucht’s<br />
corps to the south.<br />
The Fifth Panzer commander seems to<br />
have been fairly optimistic, although he<br />
gave little ear to Hitler’s promise of air<br />
support. He personally rated four of his<br />
armored divisions <strong>as</strong> good attack forma-<br />
tions (the 116th, 2d, Panzer Lehr, and<br />
Fuehrer Begleit) , and his panzer corps<br />
commanders were of his own choosing.<br />
Krueger and Luettwitz were old hands<br />
at mechanized warfare, had learned their<br />
business <strong>as</strong> commanders of the 1st and 2d<br />
Panzer Divisions, respectively, and had<br />
fought side by side in Lorraine. Krueger<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the elder of the two and lacked<br />
something of Luettwitz’ d<strong>as</strong>h. The latter<br />
w<strong>as</strong> a hard-driving commander, daring<br />
and tenacious, and had a reputation of<br />
giving help to neighboring formations<br />
without debate.<br />
With this team Manteuffel hoped to<br />
win a quick penetration and get rolling.<br />
His first concern would be to gain the<br />
ridge west of the Our and thus cover the<br />
armor crossings, for he recognized that<br />
it would be a difficult stream to bridge.<br />
He expected that the tactics of predawn<br />
infiltration would pay off and that his<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault detachments would have reached<br />
the crest line, L<strong>as</strong>cheid-Heinerscheid-<br />
Roder-Hosingen, before noon on D-day.<br />
He hoped that the armored debouch-<br />
ment into the bridgehead would com-<br />
mence during the early afternoon. Man-<br />
teuffel had no precise schedule for his<br />
right wing but after the war w<strong>as</strong> over<br />
would say that he had hoped for the<br />
seizure of St. Vith on the first day of the<br />
attack. One thing clearly worried him:<br />
would the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> keep pace and<br />
cover his left flank to B<strong>as</strong>togne? His<br />
appeal for a mechanized division to be<br />
given the neighboring Seventh the Fueh-<br />
rer personally denied. 2<br />
2 The memoirs of the leading personalities in<br />
the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, <strong>as</strong> collected in the German<br />
manuscript histories are detailed and uninhibited.<br />
They square in a remarkable manner with the<br />
recital of events in the American records. See<br />
especially MSS # B-151a, sequel to B–151, Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive (General der<br />
Panzertruppen H<strong>as</strong>so von Manteuffel); B–321,<br />
LVIII Panzer Corps in the Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive,<br />
16 December 1944–11 January 1945 (General der<br />
Panzertruppen Walter Krueger) ; A-939, The As-<br />
signment of the XLVII Panzer Corps in the<br />
Ardennes, 1944–45 (General der Panzertruppen<br />
Heinrich von Luettwitz) ; B–040, 26th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division in the Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive (Gen-<br />
eralmajor Heinz Kokott). See also MSS # A-955,<br />
Report on the Campaign in Northern France, the<br />
Rhineland, and the Ardennes (Oberst i. G. Hans-<br />
Juergen Dingler); B–506, LVIII Panzer Corps<br />
Artillery, 1 November 1944–1 February 1945<br />
(Generalmajor Gerhard Triepel) ; A–941, Panzer<br />
Lehr Division, 1 December 1944–26 January 1945<br />
(Generalleutnant Fritz Bayerlein) ; A-942, Panzer<br />
Lehr Division, 15–22 December 1944 (Bayerlein) .
176<br />
The 110th Infantry Sector<br />
16–18 December<br />
On the second day of December, a<br />
staff officer from General Luettwitz’<br />
XLVII Panzer Corps arrived at the head-<br />
quarters of the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> to re-<br />
ceive the highly secret word of a great<br />
counteroffensive in the Ardennes sector.<br />
At the moment Luettwitz’ corps w<strong>as</strong><br />
fighting in the bogs and swamps of<br />
southwest Holland, w<strong>here</strong> the 30<br />
British Corps and the U.S. 84th<br />
Division had essayed an attack in the<br />
sector around Geilenkirchen intended to<br />
er<strong>as</strong>e the salient retained by the Ger-<br />
mans on the left flank of the U.S. Ninth<br />
<strong>Army</strong>. Earlier the XLVII Panzer Corps<br />
headquarters had taken part in the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> counterattack against the<br />
U.S. Third’ <strong>Army</strong> in September,<br />
had been given new divisions to spear-<br />
head the brief spoiling attack in late<br />
October against the British and<br />
American advance in southwest Hol-<br />
land, and had returned to the line in<br />
this sector in mid-November to bolster<br />
the failing German defenses. Luettwitz<br />
turned the Geilenkirchen sector over to<br />
the XVII SS Corps on 6 December and<br />
moved with his staff to Kyllburg, close to<br />
the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> headquarters,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> a few trusted officers set feverishly<br />
to work on plans for Christrose, the code<br />
name for the coming offensive.<br />
The mission given Luettwitz con-<br />
formed to his reputation for drive and<br />
audacity. The XLVII Panzer Corps, if all<br />
went well, would cross the Our and Clerf<br />
Rivers, make a d<strong>as</strong>h “over B<strong>as</strong>togne” to<br />
the Meuse, seize the Meuse River cross-<br />
ings near Namur by surprise, and drive<br />
on through Brussels to Antwerp. Two<br />
things were necessary to success. First,<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Luettwitz could not allow any slackening<br />
to an infantry pace by frontal attacks<br />
against strongly defended American<br />
positions. Second, he had to disregard<br />
his own flanks, particularly on the south,<br />
and resolutely refuse to detach any force<br />
for flank protection until the main body<br />
w<strong>as</strong> west of the Meuse. The only security<br />
for the southern flank would have to<br />
come from an advance in echelon and<br />
such protection <strong>as</strong> the less mobile divi-<br />
sions of the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> could offer<br />
on the left.<br />
Intelligence reports indicated that the<br />
elements of the U.S. 28th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion likely to be encountered during the<br />
first hours of the attack were battle-<br />
weary, small in number, and widely dis-<br />
persed. The problem then, <strong>as</strong> seen by<br />
Manteuffel and Luettwitz, w<strong>as</strong> not how<br />
to achieve the initial breakthrough at the<br />
Our and Clerf Rivers, but rather how to<br />
employ the armor once these two rivers<br />
lay behind. The roads in the corps zone<br />
of attack were narrow, twisting, and cer-<br />
tain to be muddy; they were particularly<br />
bad on the axis <strong>as</strong>signed to Luettwitz’<br />
southern columns. Just e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
the roads straightened somewhat, but<br />
good tank-going could not be expected<br />
until the Marche-Rochefort line w<strong>as</strong><br />
reached midway between B<strong>as</strong>togne and<br />
the Meuse. The road center at B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
presented a special problem, a problem<br />
recognized in the first German plans.<br />
Luettwitz and the army commander ran<br />
at le<strong>as</strong>t two map exercises to arrive at a<br />
solution, but B<strong>as</strong>togne lay nineteen air-<br />
miles west of the German jump-off<br />
positions on the Our River and the final<br />
orders to Luettwitz’ divisions were<br />
couched in very general terms. One thing<br />
w<strong>as</strong> agreed upon: B<strong>as</strong>togne had to be<br />
taken before the bulk of the XL VII Pan-
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 17 7<br />
zer Corps moved beyond it to the west. 3<br />
(Map IV)<br />
The sector at the Our River in which<br />
Luettwitz’ corps would begin the attack<br />
w<strong>as</strong> a little over seven miles wide, the<br />
villages of Dahnen on the north and Stol-<br />
zembourg on the south serving <strong>as</strong> bound-<br />
ary markers. This initial zone w<strong>as</strong><br />
roughly equivalent to the American de-<br />
fensive position manned west of the Our<br />
by the 110th Infantry, the center regi-<br />
ment of the 28th Infantry Division, al-<br />
though the width of the 110th front w<strong>as</strong><br />
about two miles greater than the front<br />
<strong>as</strong>signed the panzer corps. The latter<br />
consisted of three divisions. The 26th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division (General-<br />
major Heinz Kokott) already w<strong>as</strong> de-<br />
ployed in the Eifel sector of the West<br />
Wall adjacent to the Our w<strong>here</strong> it cov-<br />
ered not only the XLVII Panzer Corps<br />
zone but a wide frontage beyond. An old<br />
line division, the 26th had fought on the<br />
E<strong>as</strong>tern Front from July 1941 to the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
days of September 1944, winning many<br />
decorations but little rest. Finally, after<br />
a grueling battle in the Baranôw-War-<br />
saw sector the division w<strong>as</strong> relieved for<br />
the first time since the beginning of the<br />
Russian campaign and brought back to<br />
Poznan, t<strong>here</strong> receiving the title of<br />
Volks Grenadier (regarded <strong>as</strong> somewhat<br />
less than an honor by the survivors of the<br />
old regular army 26th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion) .<br />
<strong>To</strong> the surprise of the division staff<br />
the t<strong>as</strong>k of re-equipping and replenishing<br />
the 26th went amazingly f<strong>as</strong>t for the be-<br />
ginning of the sixth year of the war. Re-<br />
placements, mostly from the Navy, were<br />
3 MSS # A–939 (Luettwitz); A–940, XLVII<br />
Panzer Corps in the Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive (Luett-<br />
witz); A–941 (Bayerlein); A–942 (Bayerlein). For<br />
the corps plans, see KTB: Christrose.<br />
whipped into shape by the “Old 26th,”<br />
and first-rate equipment replaced that<br />
lost in the e<strong>as</strong>t. The division com-<br />
mander, officers, and noncoms were<br />
veterans; training throughout the<br />
division w<strong>as</strong> reported <strong>as</strong> adequate.<br />
Ration strength w<strong>as</strong> more than 17,000,<br />
and forty-two 75-mm. antitank guns<br />
supplemented the weapons organic<br />
to the conventional Volks Grena-<br />
dier division. Like all such units, how-<br />
ever, the 26th w<strong>as</strong> geared to foot power<br />
and horsepower; t<strong>here</strong> were 5,000 horses<br />
in the division, including a few of the<br />
tough “winterized” Russian breed. The<br />
new mission given General Kokott w<strong>as</strong><br />
this: the 26th would force the crossings<br />
at the Our and Clerf Rivers on the left<br />
of the corps, hold open for the armor,<br />
then follow the more mobile panzer<br />
units to B<strong>as</strong>togne. At that crucial point<br />
the infantry had to take B<strong>as</strong>togne <strong>as</strong><br />
quickly <strong>as</strong> possible, with or without the<br />
help of the armored divisions. Once this<br />
barrier w<strong>as</strong> p<strong>as</strong>sed the 26th would be<br />
responsible for covering the left flank of<br />
the corps while the armored divisions<br />
made the Meuse crossings.<br />
The initial penetration by the corps’<br />
right w<strong>as</strong> charged to the armored infan-<br />
try of the famous 2d Panzer Division<br />
(Colonel Meinrad von Lauchert) , a unit<br />
that had fought the Allies all the way<br />
from Normandy back to the German<br />
frontier. When the 2d Panzer Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> relieved at the end of September its<br />
tanks were gone, but t<strong>here</strong> remained a<br />
large cadre of veterans who had escaped<br />
to the West Wall on foot. In the weeks<br />
that followed, the division rested and<br />
re-formed in the Bitburg-Wittlich area,<br />
its units moving constantly to escape<br />
Allied observation. Replacements, gen-<br />
erally better than the average, were
178 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
brought in from Austria (the home sta-<br />
tion for the 2d Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
Vienna) , and new-model Panther tanks,<br />
equipped for night fighting with the new<br />
infrared sighting apparatus, arrived fresh<br />
from <strong>as</strong>sembly plants near Breslau. On<br />
the eve of commitment the two tank bat-<br />
talions were about full strength, with 27<br />
Mark IV’s, 58 Panthers, and 48 armored<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns in the division tank parks.<br />
Sufficient trucks were available to motor-<br />
ize most of the division, but t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
shortage of tracked cross-country vehi-<br />
cles. One battalion of armored infantry<br />
w<strong>as</strong> given bicycles, and would move so<br />
slowly through the mud and over the<br />
hills that its function during the drive<br />
to the west w<strong>as</strong> simply that of a replace-<br />
ment battalion, feeding into the more<br />
mobile units up ahead.<br />
Once the 2d Panzer Division had<br />
thrown a bridge across the Our at D<strong>as</strong>-<br />
burg and the 26th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion had put a bridge in at Gemund,<br />
the well-known Panzer Lehr Division<br />
would be ready to roll, advancing behind<br />
the two forward divisions until the corps<br />
had cleared the Clerf River, then push-<br />
ing ahead of the infantry on the corps<br />
left in the race to B<strong>as</strong>togne. The Panzer<br />
Lehr (Generalleutnant Fritz Bayerlein)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> one of the divisions earmarked in<br />
November for use in the Ardennes coun-<br />
teroffensive, but the American offensive<br />
in Lorraine and Alsace had forced OKW<br />
to rele<strong>as</strong>e the Panzer Lehr from its posi-<br />
tion in the strategic reserve. Hitler had<br />
committed Bayerlein’s tanks in an abor-<br />
tive counterattack designed to roll up the<br />
exposed flank of the American Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> on the Saar. 4 This Panzer Lehr<br />
thrust failed, and at the beginning of<br />
4 Cole, The Lorraine Campaign, pp. 464–71.<br />
December Bayerlein’s command w<strong>as</strong><br />
brought north to the Eifel district for an<br />
emergency attempt at refitting. Losses in<br />
equipment had been particularly heavy.<br />
Tanks, tank destroyers, and guns were<br />
rushed up from the depots at Mayen, but<br />
on 15 December the two panzer grena-<br />
dier regiments were still missing 60 per-<br />
cent of their regular rifle strength and<br />
the panzer regiment had ready only one<br />
of its two battalions (with 27 Mark IV’s<br />
and 30 Panthers). <strong>To</strong> compensate for<br />
the armored weakness of the battered<br />
division, two battalions of armored tank<br />
destroyers and an <strong>as</strong>sault gun brigade<br />
were given Bayerlein just before the<br />
attack to the west began. The best troops<br />
and newest equipment were placed in<br />
the division reconnaissance battalion,<br />
heavily reinforced, which w<strong>as</strong> slated to<br />
join the reconnaissance battalion of the<br />
26th Volks Grenadier Division in spear-<br />
heading the advance once the Clerf<br />
River had been crossed.<br />
With three divisions, and added corps<br />
troops, the XLVII Panzer Corps pos-<br />
sessed a considerable amount of shock<br />
and fire power. Manteuffel allotted<br />
Luettwitz the 15th Volks Werfer Bri-<br />
gade (108 pieces) , the 766th Volks Artil-<br />
lery Corps (76 pieces), the 600th <strong>Army</strong><br />
Engineer Battalion, and the 182d Flak<br />
Regiment, all motorized. Each division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> reinforced with additional self-pro-<br />
pelled <strong>as</strong>sault guns or tank destroyers and<br />
each had a full complement of divisional<br />
artillery (four battalions for the infantry<br />
division and three motorized battalions<br />
in the armored divisions) . Finally Luett-<br />
witz w<strong>as</strong> promised two 60-ton bridges<br />
-capable of carrying his Panthers–and<br />
very considerable support from the<br />
Luftwaffe. Both Luettwitz and Manteu-<br />
ffel had been “promised” air support
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 179<br />
on numerous occ<strong>as</strong>ions before; so it is<br />
questionable whether either of them ex-<br />
pected the Luftwaffe to make good.<br />
Luettwitz, at le<strong>as</strong>t, pinned his faith on<br />
bad flying weather, night operations, and<br />
the large number of flak guns dispersed<br />
through his columns.<br />
The sector designated for the XLVII<br />
Panzer Corps breakthrough w<strong>as</strong> held by<br />
the 1st and 3d Battalions of the 110th<br />
Infantry (28th Infantry Division), com-<br />
manded by Col. Hurley E. Fuller. This<br />
regiment formed the division center,<br />
with the 112th Infantry on the north and<br />
the 109th Infantry aligned to the south.<br />
Battered and fatigued by weary, bloody<br />
fighting in the Hürtgen Forest, the 28th<br />
Division came into the quiet front on<br />
the Our during mid-November. 5 During<br />
the division attack of 2–15 November<br />
in the Schmidt-Vossenack sector the 28th<br />
had taken 6,184 c<strong>as</strong>ualties. The t<strong>as</strong>k of<br />
rebuilding the rifle companies, repair-<br />
ing battle damage, and training replace-<br />
ments w<strong>as</strong> of necessity a slow one. But<br />
by the middle of December the 110th<br />
Infantry had almost a full roster–a roster<br />
numbering many men and some officers<br />
who yet had to see their first action.<br />
The 109th and 112th were in like status.<br />
Fuller had only two battalions at his<br />
disposal because the 2d Battalion, lo-<br />
cated at Donnange, constituted the di-<br />
vision reserve. Anything even remotely<br />
resembling a continuous line across the<br />
9- to 10-mile regimental front w<strong>as</strong> be-<br />
yond the strength of the 1st and<br />
3d Battalions. As a substitute, a system of<br />
village strongpoints–each manned in<br />
5 The official U.S. <strong>Army</strong> history describes this<br />
fighting by the 28th Infantry Division <strong>as</strong> “one of<br />
the most costly division actions in the whole of<br />
World War 11.” MacDonald, The Siegfried Line<br />
Campaign, p. 373.<br />
about rifle company strength–w<strong>as</strong> set up<br />
on the ridge line separating the Our and<br />
Clerf Rivers, which <strong>here</strong> is traced by the<br />
excellent north-south highway connect-<br />
ing St. Vith and Diekirch. This high-<br />
way (known to the Americans <strong>as</strong> the<br />
Skyline Drive) and the garrison line<br />
paralleled the Our at a distance of one<br />
and a half to two and a half miles. Each<br />
battalion w<strong>as</strong> responsible for five out-<br />
posts along the west bank of the Our,<br />
but these vantage points were occupied<br />
only during daylight hours and then in<br />
squad strength. At night the strip be-<br />
tween the ridge and the river became<br />
a no man’s land w<strong>here</strong> German and<br />
American patrols stalked one another.<br />
Even in daytime it w<strong>as</strong> possible for Ger-<br />
man patrols to move about on the west<br />
bank, using the cover provided by the<br />
deep, wooded draws.<br />
The Our, in many places, w<strong>as</strong> no more<br />
than forty feet wide and e<strong>as</strong>ily fordable,<br />
but the roads leading to the river made<br />
circuitous and abrupt descent <strong>as</strong> they<br />
neared its banks. In the 110th zone four<br />
roads ran from the German border at<br />
the Our, up and over the Skyline<br />
Drive, and down to the Clerf. The<br />
American strongpoints were t<strong>here</strong>fore<br />
located with an eye to blocking these<br />
entry ways while at the same time de-<br />
fending the lateral ridge road which con-<br />
nected the 110th with its neighboring<br />
regiments and provided the main artery<br />
sustaining the entire division front. The<br />
northernmost of the four roads had a<br />
good all-weather surface, w<strong>as</strong> the only<br />
main through road running e<strong>as</strong>t to west<br />
through the area, and gave direct access<br />
to Clerf and B<strong>as</strong>togne. The Germans<br />
planned to connect this route to their<br />
own supply lines by bridging the Our<br />
at D<strong>as</strong>burg. The remaining roads
180 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
through the 1 10th sector normally were<br />
poor but were made worse by the rains<br />
prior to 16 December; the 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division intended to enter<br />
the two southernmost roads by throwing<br />
a bridge across at Gemünd. 6<br />
The Americans had identified the<br />
26th long since <strong>as</strong> the unit garrisoning<br />
the West Wall bunkers on the German<br />
bank. The presence of two panzer units<br />
on the 110th Infantry front w<strong>as</strong> not sus-<br />
pected. General Cota and the 28th Divi-<br />
sion Staff were prepared for some kind of<br />
German effort west of the Our, but the<br />
intelligence coming down from higher<br />
headquarters pointed only to the possi-<br />
bility of a limited German attack against<br />
the 109th Infantry and the American<br />
communications running north from<br />
Luxembourg City. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no hint<br />
from any source that the enemy w<strong>as</strong><br />
about to strike squarely into the center<br />
of the 28th Division and in over-<br />
whelming array.<br />
In the late afternoon of 15 December<br />
General Luettwitz gat<strong>here</strong>d his division<br />
commanders in the XLVII Panzer Corps<br />
forward headquarters at Ringhuscheid<br />
6 The American sources for the initial ph<strong>as</strong>e of<br />
the defense in this sector are unusually complete.<br />
The 28th Division after action report shows the<br />
lines of withdrawal and is supplemented in detail<br />
by the 28th Division G–3 journal and telephone<br />
file. The 109th Infantry after action report and<br />
journal are intact and useful. (See also The Old<br />
Gray Mare of the 109th Infantry Regiment (Augs-<br />
burg. 1953.)) The 110 Infantry h<strong>as</strong> not only a<br />
regimental after action report but one for each<br />
of its battalions; however the 110th journal is<br />
missing for the period prior to 24 December 1944.<br />
The 112th Infantry S–2 and S–3 journals have<br />
numerous overlays showing the action. Combat<br />
interviews provide good coverage for most of the<br />
major actions by the 28th Division. For the<br />
German sources see note 2, above. See also The<br />
Rise and Fall of the 2d Panzer Division (MS)<br />
edited by T<strong>US</strong>A, 1 PW, May 1945; MS # P-032d<br />
(Generalmajor Hans Kokott) .<br />
for final instructions and introduction to<br />
the new commander of the 2d Panzer<br />
Division, Colonel von Lauchert, who had<br />
been selected at the l<strong>as</strong>t moment by the<br />
Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> leader to replace an<br />
incumbent who w<strong>as</strong> not an experienced<br />
tanker. Lauchert arrived too late to<br />
meet all of his regimental commanders,<br />
but the 2d Panzer, like the rest of the<br />
corps, w<strong>as</strong> already in position to move<br />
the moment darkness came. Apprehen-<br />
sive lest the Americans be prematurely<br />
warned, <strong>Army</strong> Group B had for-<br />
bidden the movement of any troops<br />
across the Our in advance of the opening<br />
barrage set for 0530 on 16 December.<br />
Conforming to these instructions<br />
the 2d Panzer Division moved its <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
columns to D<strong>as</strong>burg during the night<br />
of 15–16 December but halted in <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembly are<strong>as</strong> e<strong>as</strong>t of the river.<br />
On the corps left, however, General<br />
Kokott and the 26th Yolks Grenadier<br />
Division jumped the gun. Kokott’s<br />
screening regiment, the 78th, had been<br />
in the habit of throwing out an outpost<br />
line west of the Our from nightfall till<br />
dawn. On the evening of 15 December<br />
the outpost troops, considerably rein-<br />
forced, crossed to the west bank <strong>as</strong> usual<br />
and moved cautiously forward. About<br />
0300 engineers manning pneumatic rub-<br />
ber boats began ferrying the So-man<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault companies and heavy infantry<br />
weapons across the river. As each com-<br />
pany debarked it marched inland to the<br />
line of departure which the outpost force<br />
now held close to the American gar-<br />
rison points. The 77th Regiment formed<br />
on the right near Hosingen and the 39th,<br />
echeloned to the left and rear, <strong>as</strong>sembled<br />
in the woods north of Wahlhausen.<br />
With surprise almost certainly <strong>as</strong>sured<br />
and the knowledge that the Americans
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 181<br />
had no cohesive line of defense, General<br />
Kokott had ordered the 77th Regiment<br />
to circle north of Hosingen and head<br />
straight for the Clerf bridges at Drauf-<br />
felt, while the 39th cut cross-country,<br />
avoiding the villages on the western side<br />
of the ridge line, and seized the road<br />
junction and bridges at Wilwerwiltz on<br />
the Clerf. The eye of the division com-<br />
mander would be on the <strong>as</strong>sault echelons<br />
of his right wing regiment, for they<br />
would make the main effort to reach<br />
the Clerf. The timetable for the 26th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division advance called<br />
for both its attacking regiments to<br />
reach the Clerf River by nightfall of<br />
the first day. Ad<strong>here</strong>nce to this schedule<br />
meant that the villages garrisoned by<br />
the American companies would have<br />
to be avoided or captured quickly.<br />
The units of the 110th Infantry were<br />
disposed <strong>as</strong> follows to face three full<br />
German divisions. On the left of the<br />
regimental zone, the 1st Battalion (Lt.<br />
Col. Donald Paul) held the intersection<br />
of the Skyline Drive and the D<strong>as</strong>burg-<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne main highway at Marnach, em-<br />
ploying Company B and a platoon from<br />
the 630th Tank Destroyer Battalion. <strong>To</strong><br />
the southwest, Company C and the reg-<br />
imental cannon company were deployed<br />
in and around Munshausen, guarding<br />
the side road which cut cross-country<br />
from Marnach to Drauffelt. Company A,<br />
at Heinerscheid, w<strong>as</strong> on the extreme left<br />
flank of the 110th and so lay outside<br />
the path of the XLVII Panzer Corps<br />
attack, <strong>as</strong> did Company D at Grind-<br />
hausen. The 3d Battalion (Maj. Harold<br />
F. Milton) formed the regimental right,<br />
with its companies on both sides of the<br />
ridge line. Company K, reinforced by<br />
Company B, 103d Engineer Combat Bat-<br />
talion, garrisoned Hosingen, a village on<br />
the Skyline Drive overlooking two of<br />
the four roads which wound from the<br />
Our up over the ridge. <strong>To</strong> the south<br />
Company I held Weiler-les-Putscheid, a<br />
hamlet in a knot of trails and byroads<br />
on the forward slopes of the ridge line.<br />
The 110th Antitank Company w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
Hoscheid just to the west. Both of these<br />
positions lay adjacent to the prospective<br />
boundary between the XL VII and<br />
LXXXV Corps. West of the ridge,<br />
Company L in Holzthum and the head-<br />
quarters company and Company M in<br />
Consthum barred a direct approach to<br />
the Clerf crossing site at Wilwerwiltz.<br />
Behind the Clerf River and to the west<br />
of the regimental command post in the<br />
town of Clerf the 2d Battalion (Lt. Col.<br />
Ross C. Henbest) lay in divisional re-<br />
serve. Separated of necessity by the width<br />
of the front and the requirements of<br />
some depth in the defenses athwart the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t-west roads, the units of the 110th<br />
could offer little reciprocal support a-<br />
gainst an enemy attacking in any force.<br />
The m<strong>as</strong>sed guns and Werfers of<br />
the XLVII Panzer Corps which roared<br />
out at 0530 on 16 December gave the<br />
Americans their first warning. But the<br />
tactical effect of this artillery prepara-<br />
tion w<strong>as</strong> considerably less than the<br />
German planners had anticipated. The<br />
telephone wires connecting the Amer-<br />
ican-held villages were shot out in the<br />
first few minutes and Fuller could not<br />
reach any of his battalions; artillery<br />
radios, however, continued to function.<br />
The German barrage, with a limited<br />
number of rounds at the guns, dwindled<br />
away after about half an hour to sporadic<br />
salvos and stray single shots, leaving the<br />
advancing infantry without cover while<br />
they were still short of the American<br />
positions.
182 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
The first word of the approaching<br />
enemy reached the 110th Infantry head-<br />
quarters at Clerf shortly after 0615. Com-<br />
pany L, on the western side of the ridge<br />
at Holzthum, reported figures in the<br />
half-light but, peering through the<br />
ground fog, which clung all along the<br />
division front, could not be sure whether<br />
they were American troops p<strong>as</strong>sing<br />
through the area or the enemy. In fact,<br />
detachments of the 39th Regiment had<br />
crossed the Skyline Drive unobserved<br />
and were moving in to surprise Holz-<br />
thum. <strong>To</strong> some extent, then, Kokott’s<br />
decision in favor of premature <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
west of the Our had gained ground for<br />
the 26th. Fuller, however, w<strong>as</strong> able to<br />
get a warning message through to the<br />
28th Division command post about 0900.<br />
As the morning p<strong>as</strong>sed the small Ger-<br />
man detachments west of the ridge in-<br />
cre<strong>as</strong>ed in strength. Before noon five<br />
separate <strong>as</strong>saults had been made at Cons-<br />
thum, but all were beaten off by small<br />
arms, .50-caliber, and artillery fire. Fin-<br />
ally the Germans took the village, only<br />
to be driven out again. A German at-<br />
tempt to cut the road between Cons-<br />
thum and Holzthum failed when Capt.<br />
Norman G. Maurer, S–3 of the 3d Bat-<br />
talion, leading a sortie of twenty men,<br />
surprised the enemy and drove him<br />
back with very heavy c<strong>as</strong>ualties. Be-<br />
tween Holzthum and Buchholz, Battery<br />
C of the 109th Field Artillery w<strong>as</strong> hit<br />
hard but held its positions, firing the<br />
105-mm. howitzers with one- and two-<br />
second fuzes. The battery commander<br />
and fifteen gunners were c<strong>as</strong>ualties of<br />
the close-range fight before help arrived.<br />
This came late in the morning, after the<br />
28th Division commander, General Cota,<br />
ordered a tank platoon from the 707th<br />
Tank Battalion forward to clear the Ger-<br />
man infantry out of the Battery C area.<br />
The 26th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
poured more troops into the 3d Bat-<br />
talion sector, compressing the American<br />
companies in the village positions. At<br />
the crossroads village of Hosingen atop<br />
the Skyline Drive, the leading detach-<br />
ments of the 77th swung to the north,<br />
cutting the road but moving on in the<br />
direction of the Clerf. The 2d Buttlion<br />
of the 77th, under the cover provided<br />
by German artillery, drove in to the<br />
south edge of Hosingen, contrary to<br />
orders, and t<strong>here</strong> grappled in house-to-<br />
house fighting with Company D and<br />
Company B, 103d Engineer Battalion.<br />
Meanwhile the 39th Regiment, eche-<br />
loned to the left of the 77th, ran into<br />
a snag. The 1st Platoon of Company<br />
I had been deployed along the Wahl-<br />
hausen road on the forward slope of the<br />
ridge, covering an observation post.<br />
From this point the American artil-<br />
lery observers could see the enemy <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembling in the woods just to the<br />
north. Accurately adjusted fire held the<br />
enemy battalion at bay and forced it<br />
to call on neighboring battalions, at-<br />
tacking Weiler, to help outflank the<br />
thin infantry line on the Wahlhausen<br />
road.<br />
The defenders at Weiler would not<br />
be e<strong>as</strong>ily pushed <strong>as</strong>ide. Company I (mi-<br />
nus the platoon at Wahlhausen) , a sec-<br />
tion of 81-mm. mortars, and an antitank<br />
platoon repelled wave after wave of at-<br />
tacking German infantry. When the mor-<br />
tar crews and antitank platoon had used<br />
all their ammunition they joined the<br />
infantry in the center of the village and<br />
fought <strong>as</strong> riflemen. Twice during the<br />
morning the attackers were allowed to<br />
send in aid men and remove their<br />
wounded. At 1330 the enemy ce<strong>as</strong>ed
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 183<br />
GERMAN TROOPS ADVANCING PAST ABANDONED AMERICAN EQUIPMENT<br />
fire and sent forward a white flag, with<br />
an offer for the Americans to surrender.<br />
When this w<strong>as</strong> refused the Germans sys-<br />
tematically set to work to surround the<br />
village; by dark they had ringed Weiler.<br />
In the 1st Battalion zone to the north<br />
the advance detachments of the 2d Pan-<br />
zer Division moved straight for Marnach,<br />
attempting with one quick blow to clear<br />
the Americans obstructing the through<br />
road from D<strong>as</strong>burg to Clerf. 7 While the<br />
German engineers labored at the D<strong>as</strong>-<br />
burg site to bring their heavy tank<br />
7 The road from D<strong>as</strong>burg through Clerf is<br />
marked on the OB WEST operations map by a<br />
purple penciled line <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
bridging equipment down to the river,<br />
the 28th Panzer Engineer Battalion and<br />
the 2d Battalion, 304th Panzer Gren-<br />
adier Regiment, crossed the Our in rub-<br />
ber boats and moved west through the<br />
predawn darkness. The advance w<strong>as</strong> de-<br />
layed somewhat when the grenadiers<br />
marched into an American mine field,<br />
but by 0800 the leading Germans had<br />
reached Marnach. Company B and a pla-<br />
toon of the 630th Tank Destroyer Bat-<br />
talion were well entrenched t<strong>here</strong> and<br />
gave the Germans a warm reception, al-<br />
though themselves under fire from bat-<br />
teries e<strong>as</strong>t of the Our. Minus his heavy<br />
weapons, the enemy failed to knock the
184 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Marnach garrison out of the way, but<br />
an hour later Company B radioed that<br />
three hundred Germans were northwest<br />
and southwest of Marnach. The 1st Bat-<br />
talion commander had already ordered<br />
Company A, located three miles farther<br />
north on the Skyline Drive at Heiner-<br />
scheid, to send a patrol south and make<br />
contact with Company B. In midmorn-<br />
ing Paul ordered Company C to march<br />
north from Munshausen, leaving the can-<br />
non company t<strong>here</strong>, and counterattack<br />
the Germans in the Company B area.<br />
By this time, however, the advance<br />
infantry detachments of the 2d Panzer<br />
Division were not only involved in a<br />
battle to knock out Marnach but were<br />
pushing p<strong>as</strong>t the village en route to<br />
Clerf. The 24-man patrol from Com-<br />
pany A ran into the German flank at<br />
Fishbach, about 1120, and had to with-<br />
draw under intense fire. Two hours later<br />
the enemy struck at Company A, ap-<br />
parently an attempt to clear the north-<br />
south Skyline Drive, but artillery fire<br />
beat him off. In the meantime the Com-<br />
pany C advance north toward Marnach<br />
also ran into trouble: persistent small<br />
arms fire forced the infantry to leave<br />
the road and move slowly across country.<br />
Tanks, ordered up from the division re-<br />
serve, had not yet arrived. In Marnach<br />
the hard-beset garrison fought on, now<br />
under the command of the battalion ex-<br />
ecutive officer, Capt. J. H. Burns, who<br />
had taken over when the company com-<br />
mander w<strong>as</strong> wounded.<br />
Back to the west, in the 28th Division<br />
command post at Wiltz, General Cota<br />
took what steps he could to help the<br />
110th Infantry. The bulk of his very<br />
limited reserve consisted of the 2d Bat-<br />
talion, 110th Infantry, and the 707th<br />
Tank Battalion. By the middle of the<br />
morning it w<strong>as</strong> apparent that the VIII<br />
Corps w<strong>as</strong> under attack all along the<br />
front and that the 28th Division would<br />
have to make out with what it had.<br />
Radio communication, which w<strong>as</strong><br />
functioning fairly well, showed that the<br />
division center w<strong>as</strong> most endangered.<br />
About 1000, t<strong>here</strong>fore, General Cota<br />
ordered Companies A and B of the 707th<br />
Tank Battalion to reinforce the 110th<br />
Infantry, with the intention of clearing<br />
up the deepest enemy penetrations and<br />
sweeping the ridge road clear. Although<br />
Fuller pled for the return of the 2d Bat-<br />
talion to his regiment, Cota refused to<br />
rele<strong>as</strong>e this l<strong>as</strong>t division reserve.<br />
Shortly before noon a platoon of Com-<br />
pany B’s tanks reached the hard-pressed<br />
field artillery battery near Buchholz and<br />
reported the situation in hand. 8 But the<br />
enemy <strong>here</strong> represented only the<br />
probing forefinger of the main attack.<br />
Company B moved e<strong>as</strong>t to aid the 3d<br />
Battalion, and Company A, less a platoon<br />
in mobile reserve at Clerf, moved to the<br />
northern sector. At nearly every point<br />
the American tanks would have to fight<br />
their way down the roads to reach the<br />
infantry holding the villages. <strong>To</strong> the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, at D<strong>as</strong>burg, the German engineers<br />
were straining to finish the tank bridge<br />
which would bring the German armor<br />
into play. Time w<strong>as</strong> running out for<br />
the American companies: ammunition<br />
8 An M16 half-track from the 447th Antiaircraft<br />
Artillery (Automatic Weapons) Battalion w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
sponsible for the fact that this battery w<strong>as</strong> still<br />
in position. Early that morning a German com-<br />
pany had marched up to a crossroads w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
half-track w<strong>as</strong> standing, apparently intending to<br />
deploy for an attack against the battery. Seeing<br />
the vehicle, the enemy column paused. One of<br />
the crew thought f<strong>as</strong>t and waved the Germans<br />
forward in friendly f<strong>as</strong>hion. When the .50-caliber<br />
machine guns on the half-tracks ce<strong>as</strong>ed fire nearly<br />
one hundred German dead were counted.
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 185<br />
w<strong>as</strong> low and the short winter day w<strong>as</strong><br />
drawing to a close–with the likelihood<br />
that the small garrisons would be over-<br />
whelmed in the darkness by sheer weight<br />
of numbers.<br />
On the Wahlhausen road the 3d Bat-<br />
talion observation post, defended by the<br />
Company I platoon, called for ammuni-<br />
tion and w<strong>as</strong> told that tanks were being<br />
sent with resupply. At Weiler the rest<br />
of the company and the antitank platoon,<br />
their supply of ammunition dwindling,<br />
also awaited the tanks. For some re<strong>as</strong>on<br />
the tank platoon sent from the 707th<br />
had not reached the Company I area<br />
when night fell. About 1830 troops at<br />
the battalion observation post reported<br />
that enemy vehicles were attacking<br />
with multiple 20-mm. guns and <strong>as</strong>ked<br />
for American artillery fire on their own<br />
positions. This w<strong>as</strong> the end. Only one<br />
man escaped. At Weiler the Americans,<br />
with only a few rounds left, were com-<br />
pletely surrounded and decided to fight<br />
their way out. They divided into two<br />
groups and headed west through the<br />
enemy lines.<br />
On the west slopes of the ridge a pla-<br />
toon of medium tanks w<strong>as</strong> committed<br />
early in the afternoon to drive the Ger-<br />
mans off the side road linking Holzthum<br />
and Consthum. Co-ordination between<br />
small packets of infantry and armor,<br />
hard at best, w<strong>as</strong> made most difficult by<br />
this kind of piecemeal commitment. The<br />
tankers had been told that t<strong>here</strong> were<br />
no friendly troops on the road and just<br />
outside Holzthum knocked out an anti-<br />
tank gun placed t<strong>here</strong> by Company I.<br />
After some delay, while the tank platoon<br />
and the infantry identified themselves,<br />
the tanks rolled south to the 3d Bat-<br />
talion headquarters at Consthum. At<br />
Hosingen, on the ridge road, Company<br />
D and Company B were fighting Ger-<br />
man infantry hand to hand inside the<br />
village. In response to their call for re-<br />
inforcement and ammunition four tanks<br />
fought their way through the German<br />
infantry along the Skyline Drive, arriv-<br />
ing in Hosingen about 2200–but with no<br />
rifle ammunition.<br />
In the 1st Battalion sector, late in the<br />
afternoon, two tank platoons arrived in<br />
Munshausen to support Company C, al-<br />
ready on its way north to relieve Com-<br />
pany B in Marnach. Company C had<br />
been driven off the road, and the tanks,<br />
missing the infantry entirely, rolled into<br />
Marnach. One tank platoon remained<br />
t<strong>here</strong> to bolster the defense, while the<br />
other turned back to the south, picked<br />
up Company C, and, on orders,<br />
returned with the infantry to Mun-<br />
shausen. About dusk the Marnach gar-<br />
rison radioed that half-tracks could be<br />
heard moving toward the village. This<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the l<strong>as</strong>t word from Marnach. Late<br />
in the afternoon, Colonel Fuller had<br />
ordered Company D, a platoon of heavy<br />
machine guns, and a provisional rifle<br />
company h<strong>as</strong>tily <strong>as</strong>sembled from men on<br />
p<strong>as</strong>s in Clerf, to move to Reuler and<br />
protect Battery B of the 109th Field Ar-<br />
tillery Battalion, then firing in support<br />
of the troops in Marnach and very hard<br />
pressed by the enemy. These reinforce-<br />
ments arrived at Reuler in time to take<br />
a hand against the Germans pouring<br />
p<strong>as</strong>t Marnach toward Clerf and its<br />
bridges. But Battery A of the battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> swept up by the Germans who had<br />
byp<strong>as</strong>sed the left wing anchor of the<br />
regiment at Heinerscheid.<br />
During most of this first day of at-<br />
tack the German infantry had fought<br />
west of the Our without heavy weapons,<br />
although the bulk of two regiments from
186<br />
both the 26th Volks Grenadier Di-<br />
vision and the 2d Panzer Division had<br />
crossed the river and taken some part<br />
in the fight. Shortly before dark the 60-<br />
ton bridges were completed at Gemund<br />
and D<strong>as</strong>burg (inexperienced engineers<br />
and the difficulties attendant on moving<br />
the heavy structures down to the river<br />
bed had slowed construction markedly) ,<br />
and the German tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
moved across to give the coup de grâce<br />
to the villages still defended by the 110th<br />
Infantry. On the left the 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division finally achieved con-<br />
tact with the 5th Parachute Division,<br />
which had been advancing cautiously<br />
along the boundary between the 109th<br />
and 110th Infantry and had done noth-<br />
ing to help Kokott’s southern regi-<br />
ment, the 39th. With an open left flank<br />
and under artillery fire called down by<br />
the American observation post on the<br />
Wahlhausen road, the 39th swerved from<br />
the westward axis of attack and became<br />
involved at Weiler, contrary to orders.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> the American tank platoon from<br />
Company B, 707th Tank Battalion, hit<br />
into the German flank while attempt-<br />
ing to reach Weiler and, it would appear,<br />
caused disorganization and confusion.<br />
Kokott’s right, the 77th Regiment,<br />
pushed elements beyond Hosingen (ac-<br />
tually moving between the 1st and 3d<br />
Battalions of the 110th Infantry), but<br />
these detachments, stopped by the<br />
American 105-mm. howitzers and the<br />
tank platoon near Buchholz, again had<br />
to side-step in the drive to the Clerf.<br />
Back at Hosingen the attempt to break<br />
American resistance had won an early<br />
lodgment in the south edge of the vil-<br />
lage, but had achieved no more. The<br />
26th Volks Grenadier Division needed<br />
Hosingen badly. Without it the western<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
exit road from the Gemund bridge w<strong>as</strong><br />
hopelessly blocked; through Hosingen<br />
ran the main divisional supply route to<br />
the Clerf. Just before dark, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
Kokott threw a part of his replacement<br />
training battalion into the action; these<br />
fresh troops succeeded in forcing their<br />
way into the north edge of the village, al-<br />
though with heavy losses.<br />
A whole series of monkey wrenches<br />
had been thrown into the well-oiled<br />
machinery of the 26th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division. The American infantry<br />
had made excellent use of the ground<br />
and had held their positions, refusing<br />
to buckle under the weight of numbers.<br />
The 39th Regiment had got involved in<br />
local actions and been diverted from<br />
the westward axis-sustaining high los-<br />
ses in the bargain. The 77th had been<br />
unable to win a quick decision at Ho-<br />
singen. Now, at the end of the day, the<br />
armored reconnaissance battalion of the<br />
Panzer Lehr Division found itself craw-<br />
ling rather than racing west from the<br />
Gemund bridge. The road to Hosingen<br />
w<strong>as</strong> muddy and winding; but worse,<br />
at the western exit of the bridge an<br />
American abatis and a series of bomb<br />
craters blocked the flow of traffic. A<br />
few light tanks and self-propelled guns<br />
got forward late in the evening, but the<br />
bulk of the Panzer Lehr reconnaissance<br />
battalion remained backed up at the<br />
bridge.<br />
Kokott’s infantry would have to carry<br />
the battle through the night. The 39th<br />
regrouped and turned to <strong>as</strong>sault Holz-<br />
thum and Consthum in force. The 77th<br />
marched toward Drauffelt on the Clerf<br />
River, leaving the replacement training<br />
battalion to continue the fight at Hosin-<br />
gen. Kokott’s reserve regiment, the 78th,<br />
crossed the Our at dusk and moved for-
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 187<br />
ward between the two <strong>as</strong>sault regiments.<br />
On the right its 1st Battalion marched<br />
on Hosingen, bringing flame throwers<br />
and self-propelled guns to bl<strong>as</strong>t the<br />
Americans from the village; the 2d Bat-<br />
talion moved straight for the Clerf River,<br />
aiming at control of the crossings and<br />
road net at Wilwerwiltz. The 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division w<strong>as</strong> across the Our<br />
River in force but had failed to gain<br />
its first-day objective, control of the Clerf<br />
River crossings. The German infantry<br />
would have to fight step by step; the<br />
hope of a quick breakthrough had<br />
proven illusory.<br />
The story in the 2d Panzer Division<br />
zone w<strong>as</strong> the same. T<strong>here</strong> the infantry<br />
driving toward the town of Clerf had<br />
been stopped short of their objective.<br />
Marnach remained in American hands,<br />
even after the D<strong>as</strong>burg bridge w<strong>as</strong> com-<br />
pleted and the leading tanks of the 3d<br />
Panzer Regiment entered the fight. The<br />
304th Regiment had suffered severely at<br />
American hands: the regimental com-<br />
mander w<strong>as</strong> a c<strong>as</strong>ualty and one battalion<br />
had been badly scattered during the<br />
piecemeal counterattacks by the Ameri-<br />
can tank platoons.<br />
General Luettwitz w<strong>as</strong> none too<br />
ple<strong>as</strong>ed with the progress made by his<br />
two attack divisions on this first day.<br />
But the credit side of the ledger showed<br />
a few entries. The two heavy tank bridges<br />
were in, the Americans obviously were<br />
weakening, and the 2d Panzer Divi-<br />
sion had been able to move its tanks<br />
forward on the relatively good road in<br />
the northern part of the corps zone.<br />
Luettwitz concluded that the Clerf River<br />
now would be crossed not later than<br />
the evening of the second day.<br />
Across the lines General Cota had<br />
little re<strong>as</strong>on to expect that the 110th<br />
Infantry could continue to delay the<br />
German attack at the 28th Division cen-<br />
ter <strong>as</strong> it had this first day. But at dark<br />
he ordered his regimental commanders<br />
to hold their positions “at all costs” and<br />
began preparations to commit his re-<br />
maining reserves to restore the situation<br />
in the Marnach sector and block the<br />
road to Clerf. This seemed to be the<br />
most endangered sector of the whole<br />
division front, for <strong>here</strong> the 2d Panzer<br />
Division had been identified and <strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> the main hard-surface road to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. As yet, however, the Americans<br />
had no way of knowing that the bulk<br />
of the 2d Panzer Division actually w<strong>as</strong><br />
moving down the road to Clerf or that<br />
a counterattack would collide with any<br />
such German force.<br />
Meanwhile, General Middleton, the<br />
VIII Corps commander, issued a hold-<br />
f<strong>as</strong>t order to all his troops. All VIII Corps<br />
units were to hold their positions until<br />
they were “completely untenable,” and<br />
in no event would they fall back beyond<br />
a specified final defense line. In the<br />
110th Infantry sector this line ran<br />
through Lieler and Buchholz to Lellin-<br />
gen. It w<strong>as</strong> breached at midnight when<br />
tanks and self-propelled guns of the<br />
3d Panzer Regiment entered Marnach.<br />
General Cota still had in hand a re-<br />
serve on the night of the 16th, but it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the l<strong>as</strong>t reserve of the 28th Division.<br />
It consisted of the 2d Battalion, 110th<br />
Infantry, at Donnange and the light tank<br />
company of the 707th Tank Battalion,<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> located at Weiswampach be-<br />
hind the division north flank in support<br />
of the 112th Infantry. By the late<br />
evening the picture <strong>as</strong> seen at the<br />
division command post had cleared<br />
to this extent: the two flank regiments,<br />
the 109th and 112th, had lost rela-
188 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tively little ground; the 110th w<strong>as</strong> very<br />
hard pressed; and German tanks were<br />
moving along the main road to B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
by way of Marnach. At 2100, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
General Cota turned the reserve rifle bat-<br />
talion back to the 110th Infantry, minus<br />
Company G which w<strong>as</strong> moved to Wiltz to<br />
defend the division command post, and<br />
agreed with Colonel Fuller’s proposal<br />
that the battalion be used in an attack<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tward to restore American control at<br />
Marnach. At the same time the light tank<br />
company in the 112 th area w<strong>as</strong> alerted by<br />
division headquarters for an attack south<br />
along the Skyline Drive, also directed to-<br />
ward Marnach, <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> daylight came.<br />
<strong>To</strong> complete the concentration against<br />
the enemy in or around Marnach, Col-<br />
onel Fuller ordered the medium tank<br />
platoon in Munshausen to attack to the<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t with a rifle platoon from Com-<br />
pany C. When Fuller heard of the light<br />
tanks, he ordered Colonel Henbest to<br />
delay the 2d Battalion attack next morn-<br />
ing until the incoming tank detachment<br />
w<strong>as</strong> ready to attack on the Skyline Drive.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> still hope on the morning<br />
of 17 December that at le<strong>as</strong>t one platoon<br />
from Company B w<strong>as</strong> holding on in<br />
Marnach. About 0730 the two rifle com-<br />
panies of the 2d Battalion jumped off<br />
at the ridge e<strong>as</strong>t of Clerf. In a matter<br />
of minutes the left company ran into a<br />
strong German skirmish line, deployed<br />
at the edge of a wood, which w<strong>as</strong> sup-<br />
ported by tanks and self-propelled artil-<br />
lery firing from around Marnach. The<br />
battalion commander ordered his right<br />
company down to block the paved road<br />
from Marnach to Clerf, but this road<br />
w<strong>as</strong> in the hands of the 2d Panzer Divi-<br />
sion, whose tanks were rolling toward<br />
the Clerf bridges. The American artil-<br />
lery, earlier emplaced behind the left<br />
wing of the 110th, had been overrun or<br />
forced to displace. Only one battery of<br />
the 109th Field Artillery Battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
firing during the morning and it ran<br />
low on ammunition. This battery w<strong>as</strong><br />
driven from Buchholz with the loss of<br />
half its howitzers. By noon the 2d Bat-<br />
talion, helpless against m<strong>as</strong>sed tanks and<br />
without artillery support, w<strong>as</strong> held in<br />
check along the ridge running southwest<br />
from Urspelt to the Clerf road, only a<br />
thousand yards from its line of depar-<br />
ture.<br />
The southern prong of the three-<br />
pronged counterattack to shut off the<br />
German armored drive moving through<br />
Marnach toward Clerf also w<strong>as</strong> out-<br />
gunned and outnumbered but did reach<br />
Marnach, only to report that no friendly<br />
infantry could be found. About 1000 the<br />
small tank-infantry team w<strong>as</strong> allowed to<br />
return to its original position at Muns-<br />
hausen, and Fuller then ordered the<br />
tank platoon to fight its way to Clerf<br />
and help defend the town. These two<br />
attacks from west and south had made no<br />
headway but were not too costly.<br />
The attack by the light tank company<br />
of the 707th along the Skyline Drive w<strong>as</strong><br />
dis<strong>as</strong>trous. About 0720 the company<br />
crossed into the 110th Infantry zone,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> the ground rose away from the<br />
highway and forced the tanks to advance<br />
in column on the road. As the column<br />
emerged from the village of Heiner-<br />
scheid, concealed high-velocity guns<br />
opened on the skimpily armored light<br />
tanks, picking them off like clay pipes<br />
in a shooting gallery. Eight tanks were<br />
knocked out by the enemy gunners and<br />
in the confusion three more fell prey to<br />
bazooka fire. The entire action l<strong>as</strong>ted<br />
ten minutes. Two of the American tanks<br />
turned back to Heinerscheid, only to be
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 189<br />
destroyed during the German <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
later in the day. The company com-<br />
mander withdrew the remaining five<br />
tanks on a side road and reached Urspelt,<br />
taking position near the 2d Battalion<br />
command post. 9<br />
The American pincers action had<br />
failed to constrict at Marnach. Yet t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> still an opportunity to retard the<br />
2d Panzer march along the road to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. Less than two miles west of<br />
Marnach lay the Clerf River and the<br />
town of Clerf, the latter the head-<br />
9 MS # A-940 (Luettwitz). The 707th Tank<br />
Battalion h<strong>as</strong> a detailed unit journal in narrative<br />
form.<br />
quarters of the 110th Infantry. The town<br />
itself lies in a horseshoe bend of the<br />
river. From town and river rise wooded<br />
and precipitous slopes, particularly sharp<br />
and difficult to the e<strong>as</strong>t. Descent to<br />
the town and its bridges is made on<br />
this side by two winding roads. The<br />
main paved road from Marnach ap-<br />
proaches Clerf through a shallow draw,<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sing just to the south of the little<br />
village of Reder, which perches on<br />
the high ground overlooking the river<br />
bend. This road makes a twisted and<br />
tortuous descent to the valley floor,<br />
finally crossing the river at the south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern edge of the town and pro-<br />
CLERF
190 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
ceeding through narrow streets until it<br />
emerges on the north. A secondary road,<br />
on the right of the through highway to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne, approaches Clerf from the<br />
hamlet of Urspelt. A sharp hairpin turn<br />
breaks the descent; then the road crosses<br />
the river into the northern edge of Clerf<br />
near the railroad station and enters the<br />
main highway. In sum, the way through<br />
Clerf would be none too e<strong>as</strong>y for an<br />
armored division. 10<br />
Colonel Fuller’s command post w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
a hotel only a few yards from the north<br />
bridge. Across town the regimental headquarters<br />
company w<strong>as</strong> billeted in an<br />
ancient chateau, now partially modernized<br />
but retaining the heavy stone walls<br />
behind which, since the twelfth century,<br />
fighting men had dominated the river<br />
bend and controlled the main bridge<br />
site. In the late evening of 16 December<br />
German artillery began to range into<br />
Clerf, apparently covering the advance<br />
of patrols from Marnach. About 0345<br />
the German artillery quieted. Small detachments<br />
with burp guns now crept<br />
down through the dark and engaged the<br />
troops in and around the chateau. At<br />
dawn a single tank or self-propelled gun<br />
began firing from the curving road to<br />
the south; more enemy infantry joined<br />
the fire fight near the chateau <strong>as</strong> the<br />
morning advanced.<br />
Then rolling down the Marnach road<br />
came the German advance guard, perhaps<br />
two platoons of Mark IV tanks and<br />
<strong>as</strong> many <strong>as</strong> thirty half-tracks filled with<br />
armored grenadiers. Colonel Fuller had<br />
ordered a platoon of the 2d Battallion<br />
to swing south and bar the<br />
10 The 110th Infantry action <strong>here</strong> is described in<br />
<strong>History</strong> of the 110th Infantry of the 28th Division,<br />
United States <strong>Army</strong>, World War II, 1941–1945<br />
(Atlanta, Ga.: Albert Love Enterprises, 1945).<br />
road, but it w<strong>as</strong> already dominated<br />
by the German armor. About 0930 the<br />
2d Platoon of Company A, 707th Tank<br />
Battalion, climbed out of Clerf to meet<br />
the German Mark IV’s. At the top of<br />
the <strong>as</strong>cent the tanks met: four German<br />
tanks were knocked out, three American<br />
tanks destroyed. The 1st Platoon of Com-<br />
pany A, which had returned to Muns-<br />
hausen after the unsuccessful attempt<br />
to reach Marnach, moved north mean-<br />
while to help the 2d Platoon. A radio<br />
message alerted the commander to the<br />
danger of a direct approach; so the pla-<br />
toon and some accompanying infantry<br />
entered Clerf by a secondary road along<br />
the river. German tanks opened fire<br />
on them, but a direct hit stopped the<br />
leading Mark IV, for the moment effec-<br />
tively blocking the serpentine approach<br />
from Marnach. At the chateau, however,<br />
headquarters company still w<strong>as</strong> hard<br />
pressed by riflemen and machine gun-<br />
ners in the houses nearby. And German<br />
tanks still fired from the e<strong>as</strong>tern height.<br />
Shortly before noon German pressure<br />
noticeably relaxed. E<strong>as</strong>t of Clerf the left<br />
flank of the 2d Battalion started to move<br />
forward against an enemy <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
point in a woods northe<strong>as</strong>t of Reuler.<br />
This threat north of the Marnach road<br />
seems to have caused the German com-<br />
mander some concern. Then too, some<br />
welcome tank support had arrived on<br />
the scene. On General Middleton’s order,<br />
CCR, 9th Armored Division, had put a<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force backstop position behind the<br />
threatened center of the 28th Division.<br />
Company B of the 2d Tank Battalion,<br />
en route to set up a roadblock north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Clerf, w<strong>as</strong> appropriated by Gen-<br />
eral Cota and sent to support the 110th<br />
Infantry. It arrived in Clerf with nine-<br />
teen medium tanks. Colonel Fuller set
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 191<br />
one platoon to clearing the Germans<br />
out of the south end of town, sent one<br />
platoon to Reuler to help the 2d Bat-<br />
talion, and sent one to the 1st Battalion<br />
at Heinerscheid w<strong>here</strong> the light tanks of<br />
the 707th Tank Battalion had been<br />
sm<strong>as</strong>hed earlier in the day. The appear-<br />
ance of the Shermans in Clerf cooled the<br />
ardor of the German infantry.<br />
The 2d Panzer Division advance<br />
guard had taken a bloody nose on the<br />
Marnach road, but more tanks and in-<br />
fantry were arriving hourly and maneu-<br />
ver w<strong>as</strong> possible. During the afternoon<br />
the Germans pressed the 2d Battalion<br />
back through Reuler, the Americans<br />
fighting stubbornly with the aid of the<br />
dwindling tank force from the 9th<br />
Armored Division and the few remain-<br />
ing towed tank destroyers of Company<br />
B, 630th Tank Destroyer Battalion. A<br />
platoon of self-propelled tank destroyers<br />
had arrived early in the afternoon but<br />
left precipitately, losing one gun <strong>as</strong> it<br />
careened down the road back through<br />
Clerf. Shortly before dusk Companies E<br />
and F dug in on a ridge north of<br />
Reuler under a rain of German shells.<br />
On their left German tanks were wip-<br />
ing out the l<strong>as</strong>t posts of the 1st Bat-<br />
talion. At Heinerscheid, Company A had<br />
been overrun in midafternoon, leaving<br />
open an avenue into the 2d Battalion<br />
left flank. Then the enemy grenadiers<br />
encircled the American roadblock at<br />
Urspelt, w<strong>here</strong>upon the light tank pla-<br />
toon destroyed its single remaining tank<br />
and withdrew on foot to Wiltz–the 2d<br />
Battalion flanks were wide open.<br />
Colonel Lauchert w<strong>as</strong> worried about<br />
the slow rate of the 2d Panzer advance.<br />
He even dispatched a kampfgruppe to<br />
seize a bridge considerably south of Clerf<br />
apparently intending to swing his attack<br />
column to a poorer road in the event<br />
that Clerf continued to hold. But now<br />
the north road into the town w<strong>as</strong> open.<br />
A small tank-infantry team bl<strong>as</strong>ted the<br />
single 57-mm. antitank gun in the path<br />
and crossed the bridge at the rail-<br />
road station. At the same time a tank<br />
platoon, shrouded in darkness and with<br />
no American tanks left to contest the<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sage, wound its way into the south<br />
end of Clerf. At 1825 Colonel Fuller<br />
phoned the 28th Division chief of staff<br />
that his command post w<strong>as</strong> under fire<br />
and that enemy tanks occupied the town.<br />
Fuller and some of his staff made their<br />
escape, hoping to join Company G,<br />
which had been rele<strong>as</strong>ed at division<br />
headquarters and w<strong>as</strong> supposed to be<br />
coming in from the west. Later Colonel<br />
Fuller w<strong>as</strong> captured, with a group of<br />
stragglers he commanded, while at-<br />
tempting to break through to the west.<br />
At 1839 the sergeant at the regimen-<br />
tal switchboard called the division to<br />
report that he w<strong>as</strong> alone–only the<br />
switchboard w<strong>as</strong> left.<br />
This w<strong>as</strong> not quite the end in Clerf.<br />
At the château by the south bridge 102<br />
officers and men of the regimental head-<br />
quarters company still were in action.<br />
Around them Clerf w<strong>as</strong> crawling with<br />
tanks, for most of the Mark IV Bat-<br />
talion of the 3d Panzer Regiment had<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembled in the town during the night.<br />
Perhaps the tankers were too busy loot-<br />
ing the American freight cars and supply<br />
dumps to bother with the little force in<br />
the château. Perhaps they did not care<br />
to risk bazooka fire in the dark. In any<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e the defenders made radio contact<br />
(their l<strong>as</strong>t) with the 28th Division <strong>as</strong><br />
late <strong>as</strong> 0528 on the morning of 18 De-<br />
cember. The final word on the defense<br />
of Clerf would come from the enemy.
192 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
At dawn the Panther Battalion of the<br />
3d Panzer Regiment came clanking<br />
into Clerf, after a night move from the<br />
Our River, and found tanks from the<br />
Mark IV Battalion playing cat and mouse<br />
with the Americans in the château. Bul-<br />
let fire from the old stone walls w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
menace to armored vehicles, bazooka<br />
teams sent down from the château were<br />
killed or captured, and the German tank<br />
battalions moved on, north and west<br />
toward B<strong>as</strong>togne. But the German in-<br />
fantry were more vulnerable and their<br />
march w<strong>as</strong> delayed for several hours be-<br />
fore engineers and self-propelled 88's<br />
finally set the riddled château afire<br />
and forced the Americans to surrender.<br />
It is impossible to <strong>as</strong>sess in hours the<br />
violence done the 2d Panzer Division<br />
timetable at Clerf, but it is clear that<br />
the race by this division to B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>as</strong><br />
lost <strong>as</strong> the result of the gallant action<br />
by the 110th Infantry in front of and at<br />
the Clerf crossings.<br />
On 18 December what w<strong>as</strong> left of the<br />
110th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> wiped out or with-<br />
drew to the west. 11 Survivors in the north<br />
headed toward Donnange and, with<br />
Company G, joined elements of the 9th<br />
Armored Division to make a stand.<br />
Those in the south fell back toward<br />
Wiltz, the division command post. The<br />
2d Battalion, surrounded on the ridge<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Clerf, attempted to filter through<br />
the enemy lines in the early morning<br />
hours. Seven officers and fifty to sixty<br />
men did reach Donnange. <strong>Of</strong> the 1st<br />
Battalion, only a part of Company C<br />
retained its organization. It had held on<br />
11 T<strong>here</strong> is no official record of the losses taken<br />
by the 110th Infantry during this ph<strong>as</strong>e of the<br />
battle. Estimates furnished the author by mem-<br />
bers of the regimental staff set the figure at about<br />
2,750 officers and men.<br />
at Munshausen, with the 110th Cannon<br />
Company and a section of tank de-<br />
stroyers, all through the 17th. 12 The rifle-<br />
men and cannoneers made a fight of<br />
it, barricading the village streets with<br />
overturned trucks, fighting from house<br />
to house. After the Germans captured<br />
the howitzers, a bazooka team of a com-<br />
pany officer and a sergeant held the<br />
enemy tanks at bay, destroying two<br />
which ventured into the village. Before<br />
daybreak on 18 December the survivors,<br />
now only a handful, started west.<br />
Remnants of the 3d Battalion had<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembled at Consthum, the battalion<br />
headquarters. The garrison of a hundred<br />
or so w<strong>as</strong> reinforced by Company L,<br />
ordered back from Holzthum to avoid<br />
entrapment. After dark on 17 December<br />
a captain led in about twenty-five men<br />
of Company I from Weiler, after a des-<br />
perate march, narrow escapes, and an<br />
ambuscade. Only Company K in<br />
Hosingen w<strong>as</strong> yet to be heard from. For<br />
two days and nights Company K and<br />
Company B of the 103d Engineer Com-<br />
bat Battalion fought off all enemy at-<br />
tempts to eradicate this block on the<br />
Skyline Drive. On the morning of the<br />
17th German tanks had set the town<br />
ablaze, but the few American Shermans<br />
had held them at bay. By that night<br />
the defenders were without ammunition,<br />
but they continued the battle with hand<br />
grenades, withdrawing slowly and stub-<br />
bornly from house to house. The Ameri-<br />
12 Events of this day are very obscure. Late in<br />
the afternoon an American tank platoon came to<br />
the edge of the village but retired, the commander<br />
reported, when no Americans could be found.<br />
This withdrawal w<strong>as</strong> h<strong>as</strong>tened by bazooka fire<br />
which crippled two of the tanks. The troops bar-<br />
ricaded in the houses later reported that they had<br />
seen no American tanks but had hit two German<br />
tanks with bazooka shots. See MS by Maj. I. D.<br />
Warden and 28th Div G–3 Jnl.
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 193<br />
can artillery by this time had displaced<br />
to the west and w<strong>as</strong> out of range. Finally,<br />
on the morning of 18 December, the<br />
surviving members of the garrison sent<br />
out a l<strong>as</strong>t radio message; they had no<br />
choice but surrender.<br />
After the fall of Hosingen the 3d Bat-<br />
talion elements in Consthum offered the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t organized resistance in the 28th<br />
Infantry Division center e<strong>as</strong>t of the Clerf<br />
River. Col. Daniel Strickler, the<br />
regimental executive officer, who now<br />
had <strong>as</strong>sumed command at Consthum, or-<br />
ganized a perimeter defense of the town,<br />
set out mines along the approaches, and<br />
disposed his three effective tanks and<br />
three armored cars to watch for the<br />
enemy armor known to be on the road<br />
from Holzthum. Some artillery support<br />
w<strong>as</strong> still available from a battery of the<br />
687th Field Artillery Battalion, whose<br />
shells swept the open fields between the<br />
two villages. A half hour before dawn<br />
on 18 December German guns and mor-<br />
tars opened heavy fire. With daylight<br />
the fire lifted and the enemy infantry<br />
advanced, attacking in one wave after<br />
another <strong>as</strong> the morning progressed but<br />
making no headway. About 1300 a thick,<br />
soupy December fog rolled in on the<br />
village. Under this natural smoke screen<br />
German tanks and grenadiers poured<br />
into Consthum. While tanks dueled in<br />
the street like gunmen of the Old West<br />
the 3d Battalion made its orderly way<br />
out the west side of the town, reorgan-<br />
ized, and <strong>as</strong> night descended marched to<br />
Nocher. T<strong>here</strong> it dug in to defend the<br />
battery which had given aid during the<br />
battle. The Bofors crews belonging to<br />
the 447th Antiaircraft Artillery lingered<br />
on near Consthum <strong>as</strong> a rear guard, dis-<br />
couraging all pursuit with their f<strong>as</strong>t, ac-<br />
curate fire. The next day General Cota<br />
ordered the battalion to Wiltz, w<strong>here</strong><br />
it would take part in the defense of the<br />
division headquarters.<br />
The 112th Infantry Sector<br />
16–20 December<br />
The German attack to penetrate the<br />
front lines of the 28th Division succeeded<br />
on the first day of the offensive in split-<br />
ting the 112th Infantry from the rest of<br />
the division. For this re<strong>as</strong>on the fight<br />
put up by the 112th Infantry on the<br />
north flank of the division had little or<br />
no effect on the operations of its sister<br />
regiment e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne. Futhermore,<br />
lack of communication between the 28th<br />
Division and its northern regiment<br />
would ultimately force the regimental<br />
commander, Col. Gustin M. Nelson, to<br />
act on his own. The action of the 112th<br />
Infantry in this part of the 28th Divi-<br />
sion story stands t<strong>here</strong>fore <strong>as</strong> an episode<br />
in itself until, after four days’ fighting,<br />
the regiment joins the forces arrayed in<br />
defense of St. Vith. 13<br />
When the 28th Division arrived on the<br />
VIII Corps front in mid-November its<br />
regiments were in pitiable condition.<br />
The fight in the Schmidt area had cost<br />
the 112th Infantry alone about 2,000<br />
killed, wounded, missing, and nonbattle<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties. In a month’s time the flow<br />
of replacements had brought the regi-<br />
ment to full strength. The regimental<br />
commander believed that morale had<br />
been restored to a high degree and that<br />
the new officers and men now were fair-<br />
ly well trained.<br />
The sector held by the 112th Infantry<br />
w<strong>as</strong> approximately six miles wide. Most<br />
of the positions occupied lay on the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
13 See below, pp. 393–95.
194 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
or German bank of the Our River. In<br />
the north, contact w<strong>as</strong> maintained with<br />
the 106th Infantry Division at a point<br />
northwest of Lützkampen The regimen-<br />
tal position, really a series of squad and<br />
platoon posts, followed a ridge line<br />
south through Harspelt and Sevenig,<br />
then bent back across the Our and<br />
followed the western slopes of the river<br />
nearly to Kalborn. Here in the south day-<br />
light patrols also operated to maintain<br />
control of the e<strong>as</strong>tern bank, although the<br />
main positions were around Lieler and<br />
Lausdorn.<br />
The 229th Field Artillery Battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> emplaced behind the north flank<br />
near Welchenhausen on the German side<br />
of the river. Two rifle battalions<br />
manned the main battle positions e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the Our: the 1st facing Lützkampen<br />
the 3d occupying and flanking Sevenig.<br />
The 2d Battalion manned observation<br />
posts and operated patrols across the<br />
river but w<strong>as</strong> deployed in a refused po-<br />
sition west of the Our. It w<strong>as</strong> accounted<br />
the regimental reserve, having fixed<br />
schemes of employment for support of<br />
the two battalions in the north by<br />
counterattack either northe<strong>as</strong>t or south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
Hills intersected by wooded draws<br />
marked the terrain in this sector. Ex-<br />
tensive pine forests covered much of the<br />
area, making observation difficult. In<br />
general the ground on the e<strong>as</strong>t bank<br />
commanded. The road net w<strong>as</strong> ade-<br />
quate, although mired by constant rain,<br />
but the two forward battalions had to<br />
be supplied at night because of German<br />
fire. The 3d Battalion positions on the<br />
German bank were built around cap-<br />
tured pillboxes, for <strong>here</strong> earlier Ameri-<br />
can advances had pierced the first line<br />
of the German West Wall. Since most<br />
of these works were “blind” the final<br />
protective line turned on foxholes and<br />
extensive patches of barbed wire which<br />
the battalion itself had constructed. Be-<br />
cause the West Wall angled away to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t near Lützkampen the 1st Battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> denied pillbox protection but, at<br />
the insistence of the regimental com-<br />
mander, had constructed a foxhole line<br />
with great care.<br />
Aside from patrol activity (generally<br />
small raids against individual pillboxes)<br />
the 112th Infantry sector had been quiet.<br />
Men in the observation posts watched<br />
the enemy move about his daily chores<br />
and reported flares and occ<strong>as</strong>ional rounds<br />
of mortar or artillery fire. Early in the<br />
month the Germans had undertaken<br />
what appeared to be a routine relief in<br />
their forward positions. On the nights<br />
of 14 and 15 December, sounds of horse-<br />
drawn vehicles and motors moving in<br />
slow gear drifted to the American out-<br />
posts; but since the same commotion had<br />
attended an earlier relief in the German<br />
lines, it w<strong>as</strong> reported and perfunctorily<br />
dismissed.<br />
The stir and movement in the enemy<br />
lines during the two nights prior to 16<br />
December w<strong>as</strong> occ<strong>as</strong>ioned by troops<br />
moving in and troops moving out. The<br />
26th Volks Grenadier Division, which<br />
had allowed the 112th to go about its<br />
training program with only very minor<br />
interruption, marched south to join the<br />
XLVII Panzer Corps and take part in<br />
the attack for B<strong>as</strong>togne. Its pillboxes and<br />
supporting positions were occupied in<br />
greater strength <strong>as</strong> the LVIII Panzer<br />
Corps (Krueger) moved in. In the<br />
first German blueprint for the Ardennes<br />
counteroffensive the latter corps had<br />
been <strong>as</strong>signed four divisions and the<br />
mission of driving to and across the
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 195<br />
Meuse River on the right of its old com-<br />
rade, the XLVII Panzer Corps. The mis-<br />
sion remained, but the troops available<br />
on 16 December were less than half the<br />
number promised: one armored division,<br />
the 116th Panzer Division, and two-<br />
thirds of an infantry division, the 560th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division.<br />
The 116th had fought itself out in<br />
almost continuous battles during the<br />
withdrawal across France and the de-<br />
fense of the West Wall but had a fine<br />
reputation and w<strong>as</strong> fairly well refitted.<br />
It had ninety-two Panthers and forty-<br />
seven Mark IV tanks; perhaps 40 per-<br />
cent of its organic vehicles were missing.<br />
The 560th, activated from inexperi-<br />
enced garrison units in Norway and<br />
Denmark, had been tagged for the Rus-<br />
sian front. Directed to the west by Hit-<br />
ler’s orders, the division would see its<br />
first action in the Ardennes. One rifle<br />
regiment and part of the division engi-<br />
neers were still in Denmark. The artil-<br />
lery supporting the LVIII Panzer Corps<br />
consisted of five battalions plus two Wer-<br />
fer battalions, and a few batteries of<br />
heavy guns. It appears that the corps had<br />
only moderate support in the way of<br />
engineers and bridge trains.<br />
The immediate mission of Krueger’s<br />
corps, like that of the XLVII Panzer<br />
Corps on its left, w<strong>as</strong> to seize crossings<br />
at the Our River. The are<strong>as</strong> selected by<br />
the two corps for their main efforts were<br />
some six to seven air-line miles apart-<br />
an indication of the weight to be thrown<br />
against the American 28th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion. The line of departure for Krueger’s<br />
corps began across the Our from Kalborn<br />
and extended north to a point e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Burg Reuland. The bulk of his two divi-<br />
sions, <strong>as</strong> a consequence, faced the 112th<br />
Infantry, albeit the corps zone overlap-<br />
ped somewhat the sectors of the 106th<br />
Infantry Division in the north and the<br />
110th Infantry in the south. Krueger<br />
had b<strong>as</strong>ed his plan of attack on the in-<br />
telligence reports dealing with the Our<br />
bridges. Since the American troops e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the Our were deployed in the Lütz-<br />
kampen-Sevenig area, Krueger deter-<br />
mined that his main effort should be<br />
made t<strong>here</strong>. Roads and bridges, he reck-<br />
oned, must be in shape to support the<br />
American troops e<strong>as</strong>t of the river. These<br />
roads and bridges he intended to seize<br />
by surprise.<br />
On the corps right, then, the 116th<br />
Panzer Division (Generalmajor Sieg-<br />
fried von Waldenburg) had orders to<br />
attack north of Lützkampen; at le<strong>as</strong>t two<br />
or more bridges crossed the Our in this<br />
sector. The 560th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion (Generalmajor Rudolf Langhaeu-<br />
ser) w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed two specific bridges<br />
<strong>as</strong> targets, one just north of Ouren, the<br />
other a stone arch a little to the south<br />
of the village. Because surprise w<strong>as</strong> es-<br />
sential in this stroke for the bridges,<br />
artillery fire on the American forward<br />
positions in the first moments of the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong> forbidden.<br />
The heavy barrage and the pyrotech-<br />
nic display which opened elsew<strong>here</strong> on<br />
the 28th Division front on 16 December<br />
w<strong>as</strong> viewed at first with some detachment<br />
by the men at the 112th observation<br />
posts. They heard, and duly reported,<br />
heavy artillery to the south, they saw<br />
searchlights and flames lighting up the<br />
sky, but again in the south. About 0620,<br />
however, the 1st Battalion phoned to<br />
say that shells were coming over the bat-<br />
talion command post. The German guns<br />
and Werfers had finally opened fire<br />
to neutralize or destroy the rearward<br />
artillery and reserve positions in the
196 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
112th sector. As the enemy gun layers<br />
dropped their range back to the river<br />
and then to the American positions, the<br />
searchlights blinked on, searching out<br />
pillboxes and bunkers. When daylight<br />
came, the German infantry already were<br />
stealing through the draws behind and<br />
around the forward platoons, aiming to<br />
<strong>as</strong>semble in the wooded are<strong>as</strong> to the<br />
rear. 14<br />
The 3d Battalion (Maj. Walden F.<br />
Woodward), in the regimental center,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> hit by the 1130th Regiment of the<br />
560th Volks Grenadier Division. This<br />
German blow fell on either side of<br />
Sevenig, held by Company L. The Amer-<br />
ican barbed wire line had not been com-<br />
pleted across the draws to the north and<br />
south of the village; through these gaps<br />
the shock companies advanced. The com-<br />
pany leading the left battalion surprised<br />
a platoon of Company L at breakf<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
overran the company kitchen (which<br />
w<strong>as</strong> only 800 to 900 yards behind the<br />
rifle line) and killed the platoon com-<br />
mander. Leaderless, the platoon broke.<br />
A part of the German company, perhaps<br />
a platoon in strength, succeeded in reach-<br />
ing the stone bridge over the Our south<br />
of Ouren, but w<strong>as</strong> dispersed.<br />
The bulk of the 3d Battalion held<br />
their positions despite surprise, defend-<br />
ing from pillboxes and foxholes. Later<br />
the Americans in this sector reported<br />
that the attackers must have been “aw-<br />
14 MSS # B–321 (Krueger); A–873, Commit-<br />
ment of the 116th Panzer Division in the Ardennes,<br />
16–26 December 1944 (Generalmajor Siegfried<br />
von Waldenburg) ; A–874, Commitment of the<br />
116th Panzer Division in the Ardennes, 1944–45<br />
(Waldenburg) : B–027, 560th Yolks Grenadzer<br />
Division, 15–29 December 1944, and 12th Yolks<br />
Grenadier Division, 1–28 January 1945 (General-<br />
major Rudolf Langhaeuser). The Germans sited<br />
their searchlights five to eight kilometers from<br />
the American main line of resistance.<br />
fully green”-<strong>as</strong> indeed they were. The<br />
enemy attempt to capture or destroy the<br />
American command posts, kitchens, and<br />
observation posts w<strong>as</strong> only partially suc-<br />
cessful, although the grenadier <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
parties were well inside the 3d Battalion<br />
positions when day broke. Two company<br />
kitchens were captured and one or two<br />
observation posts cut off, but the artil-<br />
lery observer inside Sevenig w<strong>as</strong> able to<br />
direct the 229th Field Artillery how-<br />
itzers onto the Germans in the draw.<br />
Meanwhile the mortar crews took a hand<br />
from their foxholes on the hill behind<br />
Sevenig, dropping mortar shells into the<br />
hollows w<strong>here</strong> the Germans congregated<br />
or picking them off with carbines.<br />
Early morning reports of considerable<br />
German penetration and the threat to<br />
the Our bridges in the 3d Battalion<br />
area led the regimental commander to<br />
put one of his counterattack plans into<br />
operation. At 0930 two companies of<br />
the 2d Battalion (Lt. Col. J. L. Mac-<br />
Salka) <strong>as</strong>sembled in a draw between<br />
Ouren and Lieler (west of the river),<br />
crossed the bridges–the German pa-<br />
trol at the stone bridge had evapo-<br />
rated under machine gun fire–and<br />
moved toward Sevenig. The Germans<br />
in the way quickly withdrew to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. By nightfall the 3d Battalion<br />
line on the Sevenig ridge had been<br />
restored while the commander of the<br />
1130th reported that his regiment, de-<br />
spite many attempts, had not been able<br />
“to get going.”<br />
The main effort launched by the<br />
LVIII Panzer Corps on 16 December<br />
w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed the 116th Panzer Division.<br />
This attack aimed at the bridges near<br />
Burg Reuland (in the 106th Division<br />
sector) and Oberhausen, in the rear<br />
of the positions manned by the left
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 197<br />
battalion of the 112th. General Walden-<br />
burg committed his infantry <strong>here</strong>, in the<br />
predawn hours, hoping that the 60th<br />
Regiment would break through on the<br />
right or that the 156th Regiment would<br />
reach the river on the left and so secure<br />
a bridgehead through which his tank<br />
regiment could be p<strong>as</strong>sed. The lay of<br />
the ground and defenses in the area<br />
north of Lützkampen were such that<br />
Waldenburg’s right regiment had to<br />
move northwestward at an oblique to<br />
the axis of his left wing advance.<br />
In common with the German <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
tactics employed all along the front on<br />
16 December, both regiments led off<br />
with a predawn advance by shock com-<br />
panies eighty men strong. The company<br />
from the 60th ran into trouble almost<br />
immediately when it w<strong>as</strong> immobilized<br />
in some woods northwest of Berg by<br />
flanking fire from Heckhuscheid, in the<br />
424th Infantry sector. Later reports in-<br />
dicate that this group w<strong>as</strong> almost wiped<br />
out. The <strong>as</strong>sault company from the 156th<br />
w<strong>as</strong> initially more fortunate in its ad-<br />
vance west of Lützkampen. By 0630 the<br />
grenadiers were behind the command<br />
post of the 1st Battalion (Lt. Col. Wil-<br />
liam H. Allen) in Harspelt; the first<br />
sign of their presence w<strong>as</strong> a kitchen truck<br />
ambushed while journeying to the rear.<br />
The advance party of grenadiers had<br />
moved along the wooded draw between<br />
the two companies holding the 1st Bat-<br />
talion line.<br />
When day came the Americans caught<br />
the troops following the advance party<br />
of the <strong>as</strong>sault company out in the open.<br />
Interlocking machine gun and rifle fire<br />
blocked off the German reinforcements,<br />
some sixty were captured and the rest<br />
dug in w<strong>here</strong> they could. Company D,<br />
in its support position on the high<br />
ground overlooking Lützkampen, meanwhile<br />
commenced mopping up the enemy<br />
who had filtered between the companies<br />
on the line. By noon Company D<br />
had so many prisoners that it “couldn’t<br />
handle them all!” Nonetheless some part<br />
of the <strong>as</strong>sault wave had broken through<br />
<strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the battery positions near Welchenhausen,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> they were repelled<br />
by the .50-caliber quadruple mounts of<br />
the antiaircraft artillery.<br />
Shortly before noon the advance guard<br />
of the 60th Panzer Regiment, rolling<br />
along the Lützkampen-Leidenborn road,<br />
appeared on the knoll west of Lützkampen.<br />
The seven tanks counted <strong>here</strong><br />
strangely enough made no effort to attack<br />
(perhaps the rough terrain and<br />
dragon’s teeth along the American bunker<br />
line did not appear too promising).<br />
After a brief pause they wheeled back<br />
into Lützkampen. 15 About dark infantry<br />
from Lützkampen attacked in close order<br />
formation against Company B.<br />
Maps picked up from dead Germans<br />
showed that the American machine gun<br />
positions had been exactly plotted–but<br />
<strong>as</strong> they had existed up to a change made<br />
just before the 16th. The enemy made<br />
three attacks in the same close formation<br />
over the same ground before they<br />
discovered the error of their ways. Company<br />
B, however, had been badly shot<br />
up during the engagement and probably<br />
somewhat shaken by the presence of<br />
two or three flame-throwing tanks–a new<br />
experience to most American troops on<br />
the Western Front. Nevertheless by<br />
midnight the 1st Battalion front had<br />
15 It is quite possible that the German tank ac-<br />
tivity <strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> discouraged during daylight by<br />
the sharp-shooting Private Rosenthal, manning<br />
his tank destroyer in the 424th Infantry sector.<br />
See above, ch. VII, p. 153.
198 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
quieted down, although t<strong>here</strong> still were<br />
small groups of the enemy crawling<br />
about in the gap breached that morn-<br />
ing. Lützkampen would continue <strong>as</strong> a<br />
sally port for sorties against the 1st Bat-<br />
talion and the best efforts by the Amer-<br />
ican field pieces to flatten the village<br />
failed to still the men and vehicles mov-<br />
ing in its streets.<br />
The German plans had been altered<br />
during the day, but of course some<br />
time w<strong>as</strong> needed for orders to reach<br />
the front-line troops. Bad tank-going in<br />
the West Wall maze north of Lützkam-<br />
pen and the initial reverse suffered by<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sault company of the 60th Regi-<br />
ment led the corps commander to or-<br />
der the 116th Panzer Division to pivot<br />
its weight on Lützkampen in a drive<br />
southwestward toward Ouren. Leav-<br />
ing only a screening force behind, the<br />
60th Regiment started a march intend-<br />
ed to bring it e<strong>as</strong>t of Sevenig on the<br />
left of the 156th Regiment. Although<br />
the left division (the 560th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division) had not fared too<br />
well in the attack on Sevenig, farther<br />
to the south its 1128th Regiment had<br />
seized a bl<strong>as</strong>ted bridge three kilometers<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Heinerscheid and established a<br />
bridgehead over the Our at the bound-<br />
ary between the 112th Infantry and the<br />
110th Infantry. This had been accom-<br />
plished by noon on the first day-<strong>as</strong> usu-<br />
al a boundary line had proved a point<br />
of little resistance-and the German en-<br />
gineers moved in. The approach road<br />
on the e<strong>as</strong>t bank w<strong>as</strong> blocked with trees<br />
and mines, the bridge debris would<br />
have taken much effort to clear, and to<br />
Krueger’s disappointment t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
<strong>as</strong>surance that a bridge could be in be-<br />
fore the night of 17 December. On the<br />
evening of 16 December, t<strong>here</strong>fore, the<br />
German commander ordered the corps<br />
to continue the attack for the bridges<br />
at Ouren. Meanwhile he dispatched the<br />
Reconnaissance Battalion of the 116th<br />
Panzer Division to cross the XLVII Pan-<br />
zer Corps bridge at D<strong>as</strong>burg and com-<br />
mence a sweep along the western bank<br />
calculated to take the Ouren crossings<br />
from the rear.<br />
At the close of this first day the 112th<br />
Infantry remained in its positions e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the Our. 16 The 2d Battalion had not<br />
yet been seriously engaged, although<br />
one company had been detached to<br />
reinforce the 3d. Both flanks of the<br />
regiment, however, were in process of<br />
being uncovered by enemy thrusts<br />
against the neighboring units-although<br />
this effect may not have been immedi-<br />
ately apparent. A gap remained in the<br />
center of the 1st Battalion line and small<br />
groups of the enemy were wandering<br />
along the Our River.<br />
Considerable damage had been done<br />
the German <strong>as</strong>sault forces. Although the<br />
116th Panzer Division losses were moder-<br />
ate, the inexperienced 560th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division had suffered an esti-<br />
mated 1,000 c<strong>as</strong>ualties-a figure, how-<br />
ever, that included the reinforced fusi-<br />
lier company which got lost in the woods<br />
southwest of Sevenig and w<strong>as</strong> not seen<br />
again for two days. Perhaps the Ameri-<br />
cans had some re<strong>as</strong>on for elation on the<br />
night of 16 December, but all knew that<br />
harder blows would be dealt on the<br />
morrow. Wrote one in his diary: “No-<br />
body able to sleep and no hot meals<br />
16 During the fighting on 16 December Pfc.<br />
W. S. Rush stayed in the line at an exposed<br />
point, hurling grenades and firing his rifle al-<br />
though he w<strong>as</strong> badly wounded. Rush refused to<br />
leave his post and died t<strong>here</strong> of his wounds. He<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 199<br />
today. This place is not healthy any-<br />
more.”<br />
The presence of enemy tanks in Lütz-<br />
kampen constituted a distinct threat,<br />
even to infantry in pillboxes. Colonel<br />
Nelson’s antitank reserve, Company C,<br />
630th Tank Destroyer Battalion, w<strong>as</strong> de-<br />
ployed on the ridge west of the river,<br />
but these were towed guns, dug in and<br />
relatively immobile. Even so, the unit<br />
accounted for six tanks on the 16th and<br />
broke up two panzer <strong>as</strong>saults of com-<br />
pany size. On the afternoon of the 16th<br />
the division commander had loaned<br />
Neslon the light tank company of the<br />
707th Tank Battalion, but after a sweep<br />
through the 1st Battalion area in which<br />
not a shot w<strong>as</strong> fired the tanks recrossed<br />
the river. Subsequently General Cota<br />
ordered them to go to the aid of the<br />
hard-pressed 110th Infantry. This move<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made early in the morning with<br />
dis<strong>as</strong>trous results recorded earlier. Some<br />
additional help for the 112th did arrive<br />
before daybreak on 17 December, four<br />
self-propelled tank destroyers out of the<br />
811th Tank Destroyer Battalion bor-<br />
rowed from Combat Command Reserve,<br />
9th Armored Division, at Trois Vierges.<br />
Finally, the regimental antitank and can-<br />
non companies were disposed around<br />
Ouren guarding the bridges, the roads,<br />
and the regimental command post.<br />
Through the early hours of 17 De-<br />
cember American outposts reported<br />
sounds of tank movement in Lützkam-<br />
pen. This w<strong>as</strong> the Mark V Battalion of<br />
the 116th Panzer Division <strong>as</strong>sembling to<br />
lead the attack toward the Ouren<br />
bridges. About an hour before dawn<br />
eleven searchlights flicked on, their rays<br />
glancing dully from the low clouds back<br />
onto the Lützkampen-Sevenig ridge. The<br />
German artillery could take a hand this<br />
morning, particularly since a number of<br />
forward observers had wormed into the<br />
American positions. First the Werfers<br />
and guns pounded the front line, par-<br />
ticularly the 1st Battalion positions.<br />
Then <strong>as</strong> the attack got moving they were<br />
raised to lay heavy counterbattery fire<br />
on the 229th Field Artillery Battalion<br />
(Lt. Col. John C. Fairchild). With<br />
the first light some eighteen Mark V<br />
tanks started down the ridge spur point-<br />
ing toward Ouren; at the same time the<br />
1130th Regiment and the 156th Regi-<br />
ment resumed the attack to cut off and<br />
destroy the forward American compa-<br />
nies. Company A, directly in the way,<br />
lost a platoon to tanks rolling and firing<br />
methodically along the foxhole line.<br />
Through this gap the panzers moved in<br />
on the support positions held by Com-<br />
pany D.<br />
Earlier a German infantry company<br />
in close order had been caught in the<br />
glare of its own headlights atop a hill<br />
and been m<strong>as</strong>sacred by Company D<br />
sections lying on the reverse slope, but<br />
at 0755 Company D w<strong>as</strong> forced to send<br />
out an urgent plea for help “and damn<br />
quick.” West of Harspelt the self-pro-<br />
pelled tank destroyer platoon from the<br />
811th arrived in time to destroy four<br />
of the panzers, but at the cost of all<br />
but one of its own guns. Colonel Nel-<br />
son sent back request after request for<br />
air support. The first American planes<br />
arrived at 0935, immobilizing the Ger-<br />
man tanks momentarily. Company D<br />
positions had been taken by <strong>as</strong>sault only<br />
a few minutes earlier. About this time<br />
a German tank platoon appeared on<br />
the ridge less than a thousand yards<br />
from the regimental command post in<br />
Ouren. Five hundred yards from the<br />
Germans, on the far side of a draw, the
OUREN, SHOWING BRIDGES
202 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
cannon company gunners quickly bore-<br />
sighted their pieces, loaded reduced<br />
charge, and with direct fire knocked out<br />
four of the panzers. A scratch platoon<br />
of less than fifty men collected from the<br />
regimental headquarters and Ouren<br />
held the supporting German infantry<br />
at bay along the ridge e<strong>as</strong>t of the vil-<br />
lage.<br />
The tank thrust through the 1st Bat-<br />
talion center pushed parts of compa-<br />
nies C (a platoon of which had joined<br />
the battalion from training), A, and D<br />
back through the woods toward Wel-<br />
chenhausen. Here about ten o’clock, Bat-<br />
tery C of the 229th came under direct<br />
tank fire but stopped the tanks with how-<br />
itzer fire at close range while Company<br />
C of the 447th Antiaircraft Artillery<br />
Battalion used its quad mount machine<br />
guns to chop down the infantry follow-<br />
ing behind.<br />
About noon the 2d Battalion coun-<br />
terattacked and German pressure along<br />
the 112th front began to wane. The<br />
229th Field Artillery Battalion pounded<br />
the German <strong>as</strong>sembly point at Lützkam-<br />
pen <strong>as</strong> hard <strong>as</strong> limited stock of shells<br />
permitted and fighter-bombers pl<strong>as</strong>tered<br />
the village: “air tremendously effective”<br />
reported the expectant ground observ-<br />
ers. But t<strong>here</strong> were too few guns and<br />
too few air sorties to keep the enemy<br />
immobilized for long. Probably by this<br />
time a good share of the 116th tanks had<br />
been committed. Certainly the enemy<br />
infantry were spreading rapidly through<br />
the woods and draws between the Amer-<br />
ican front line and the Our River. By<br />
13 15 the howitzers around Welchenhau-<br />
sen again were firing at their minimum<br />
range. Three-quarters of an hour later<br />
the regimental commander ordered the<br />
artillery to displace behind the river;<br />
Colonel Fairchild moved the battalion<br />
across the river without losing a piece<br />
and immediately resumed firing.<br />
Throughout this entire action the<br />
229th gave the 112th Infantry such sup-<br />
port <strong>as</strong> to elicit from the regimental com-<br />
mander the opinion that “it w<strong>as</strong> the best<br />
artillery in the army,” an expression<br />
which would be used by other infantry<br />
commanders about other artillery units<br />
during these trying days. In this c<strong>as</strong>e, <strong>as</strong><br />
in many others during the American<br />
withdrawal, the full story is that of<br />
the co-operation of the combined arms.<br />
The field artillery commander in his<br />
turn would credit the ably served .50-<br />
caliber machine guns and 40-mm.<br />
Bofors of the protecting antiaircraft com-<br />
pany with saving his howitzers.<br />
News of the battle on the right and<br />
left of the 112th Infantry sector had<br />
been sparse. During the afternoon Gen-<br />
eral Cota radioed Colonel Nelson to be<br />
especially watchful of his northern flank,<br />
but added that if his own position be-<br />
came untenable he should withdraw at<br />
dark behind the Our. About 1515 Nel-<br />
son sent his executive officer, Lt. Col.<br />
William F. Train, to the 28th Divi-<br />
sion command post with orders to report<br />
personally on the regiment’s position.<br />
Cota, <strong>as</strong> it turned out, already had<br />
phoned the corps commander and <strong>as</strong>ked<br />
permission to bring the 112th back to<br />
the high ground west of the river. Gen-<br />
eral Middleton agreed, but with the pro-<br />
viso that the regiment should remain<br />
close enough to the river to deny an en-<br />
emy crossing.<br />
Although this final word seems to<br />
have reached Ouren about 1600, Colonel<br />
Nelson did not act immediately on the<br />
order because he still had hopes that<br />
the entrapped 1st Battalion could be
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 203<br />
reached. The 3d Battalion, fighting most-<br />
ly against infantry, had held its own<br />
through the day, aided greatly by the<br />
possession of the pillbox line, far<br />
stronger than the defensive positions in<br />
the 1st Battalion sector. Then, too, the<br />
2d Battalion had once again used the<br />
stone bridge south of Ouren to launch a<br />
counterattack across the river and, dur-<br />
ing the afternoon, materially restored<br />
the 3d Battalion positions. But the Ger-<br />
man tanks were fanning out <strong>as</strong> the day<br />
drew to a close, turning attention to the<br />
south <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> the west. Patrols could<br />
not reach the 1st Battalion and at dusk<br />
the 3d Battalion reported that the pan-<br />
zers finally were in position to rake<br />
its ridge defenses with fire from the<br />
north–the pillbox line no longer w<strong>as</strong><br />
tenable. Colonel Nelson gave the order<br />
to withdraw behind the river under<br />
cover of darkness.<br />
The regimental command post staff<br />
left Ouren even while the enemy w<strong>as</strong><br />
filtering into the village and moved to<br />
Weiswampach. The speed of the Ger-<br />
man attack caught most of the regimen-<br />
tal medical company and troops from<br />
the headquarters and cannon com-<br />
panies. The 3d Battalion commenced<br />
its withdrawal at 2200 under orders to<br />
pull back through Ouren. Fortunately<br />
Major Woodward, the battalion com-<br />
manding officer, w<strong>as</strong> suspicious of this<br />
route. His suspicions were confirmed<br />
when a patrol sent into the town failed<br />
to return. The 3d Battalion then crossed<br />
the river farther to the south, circled and<br />
finally dug in along the Ouren-Weis-<br />
wampach road, w<strong>here</strong> its flank would be<br />
covered by the refused line of the 2d Bat-<br />
talion. A patrol which had been sent<br />
from the 3d Battalion to carry the with-<br />
drawal order to the 1st Battalion com-<br />
mand post, still holding on at Harspelt,<br />
failed to get through. Fortunately radio<br />
contact w<strong>as</strong> re-established from Weis-<br />
wampach shortly after midnight and<br />
the 1st Battalion w<strong>as</strong> given orders to<br />
withdraw through the former 3d Bat-<br />
talion positions. Company B, on the ex-<br />
treme north flank, had been forced<br />
back into the 424th Infantry area, but<br />
about 235 men withdrew cross-country<br />
toward Ouren.<br />
Near the village a patrol found that<br />
the stone bridge w<strong>as</strong> guarded by only<br />
a half squad of Germans. The Ameri-<br />
cans lined up in German formation and,<br />
while an officer shouted commands in<br />
German, marched boldly across the<br />
bridge. The next morning Colonel Nel-<br />
son w<strong>as</strong> able to tell General Cota, “Very<br />
good news. 1st Battalion h<strong>as</strong> worked [its]<br />
way back.” The little group from regi-<br />
mental headquarters which had been de-<br />
ployed on the ridge line at Ouren w<strong>as</strong><br />
less successful. Completely surrounded<br />
by the enemy, it had hoped to join the<br />
withdrawal of the line companies. The<br />
group never established contact, how-<br />
ever, and most of its members were cap-<br />
tured when they attempted to break<br />
away the following morning.<br />
Although the enemy had seized all<br />
of the ground which the 112th Infantry<br />
w<strong>as</strong> occupying e<strong>as</strong>t of the Our and final-<br />
ly had secured a bridgehead at Ouren,<br />
the cost to him on 17 December had<br />
been high. At le<strong>as</strong>t fifteen tanks had<br />
been disabled or destroyed on the first<br />
day and German sources indicate that<br />
this figure may have doubled on the<br />
17th. The Americans had taken 186<br />
prisoners and killed or wounded two<br />
or three times that number; the losses<br />
in the 1130th Regiment were “very<br />
high,” said the enemy reports. It is im-
204 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
possible to give an accurate count of<br />
losses in the 112th Infantry, but they<br />
seem to have been moderate. Most mem-<br />
bers of the 1st Battalion, for example,<br />
eventually found their way back to the<br />
regiment.<br />
The degree of tactical success achieved<br />
by the 112th Infantry and the fact that<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> able to hold intact <strong>as</strong> a regi-<br />
ment may be explained by a number<br />
of factors. The ground e<strong>as</strong>t of the river<br />
w<strong>as</strong> favorable to the defender, who w<strong>as</strong><br />
well entrenched <strong>as</strong> the result of careful<br />
planning and inspection by Nelson and<br />
his staff, and whose guns covered the<br />
few routes of mechanized advance. The<br />
numerous pillboxes provided a substan-<br />
tial amount of cover; the 3d Battalion,<br />
for example, w<strong>as</strong> not seriously endan-<br />
gered until the attacking tanks maneu-<br />
vered close enough for direct fire. The<br />
refused positions of the 2d Battalion<br />
allowed fairly free use of a regimental<br />
reserve during both days and good<br />
counterattack plans were ready. Equal-<br />
ly important, the green 1130th Regiment<br />
(incorporated into the 116th Panzer Di-<br />
vision attack on the second day) had<br />
failed to follow closely in the path of<br />
the tanks and so gave American rifle-<br />
men and machine gunners time to get<br />
set after the tanks rolled p<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
Even before the seizure of Ouren the<br />
LVIII Panzer Corps had shifted its in-<br />
terest to the south. By the second day<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> apparent that the combination<br />
of stubborn resistance and poor ap-<br />
proach roads would delay the projected<br />
crossing at Ouren. The orders given<br />
the 116th Panzer Division on the night of<br />
16 December to switch to the left were<br />
altered on the 17th to start its infantry<br />
regiments marching still farther south<br />
to the D<strong>as</strong>burg bridgehead held by the<br />
neighboring corps. Although delayed<br />
by inadequate deliveries of POL and<br />
the traffic jam on the damaged D<strong>as</strong>burg-<br />
Marnach road the entire division, in-<br />
cluding its tank regiment, <strong>as</strong>sembled<br />
on the west bank around Heinerscheid<br />
during the night of 17–18 December.<br />
The main body of the 560th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division also had detoured around<br />
the stubborn men and difficult ground<br />
in the 112th Infantry area, extending<br />
the bridgehead which the 1128th Regi-<br />
ment had seized e<strong>as</strong>t of Heinerscheid on<br />
17 December. Only the weakened<br />
1130th Regiment and the division fusi-<br />
lier company, once again in touch with<br />
its fellows, were left behind to extend<br />
the bridgehead formed at Ouren.<br />
All this gave the 112th Infantry a<br />
chance to get its breath on 18 December.<br />
A few attacks were started against the<br />
new American line, which now covered<br />
Beiler, Lieler, and Lausdorn, but none<br />
were energetic. Throughout the day the<br />
American outposts watched m<strong>as</strong>ses of<br />
foot troops and vehicles defile westward<br />
through Heinerscheid, only some two<br />
thousand yards to the south. The regi-<br />
mental cannon company also provided<br />
some interested spectators, who trained<br />
their howitzers on Heinerscheid with<br />
such good effect that enemy records take<br />
rueful note of this har<strong>as</strong>sing fire from<br />
the north.<br />
Communication between the 112th<br />
and division headquarters had been<br />
sketchy since 16 December, depending<br />
on artillery radio nets and liaison of-<br />
ficers. Early in the afternoon of 18 De-<br />
cember a radio message finally arrived<br />
at the division command post <strong>as</strong>king<br />
that the regiment be given instructions.<br />
General Cota had been trying through<br />
most of the morning to reach Nelson
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 205<br />
with an order to hold in essentially the<br />
positions which the regiment now occupied<br />
. 17 But the situation e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
w<strong>as</strong> growing more precarious and<br />
the division commander decided to<br />
bring the 112th back to join in the defense<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne. About 1700 he radioed<br />
new orders: the 112th Infantry<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to fight a stiff delaying action along<br />
the line Weiswampach–Trois Vierges,<br />
and thence toward B<strong>as</strong>togne. Two hours<br />
later the 112th Infantry acknowledged<br />
receipt of these instructions.<br />
Colonel Nelson decided to pull back<br />
through Huldange since enemy tanks<br />
were known to be in Trois Vierges.<br />
Early on 19 December the 112th Infantry<br />
and 229th Field Artillery Battalion<br />
moved under cover of a heavy<br />
fog and <strong>as</strong>sembled without hindrance<br />
around Huldange, the defensive front<br />
now facing south. Here Nelson received<br />
a message from the 28th Division which<br />
ordered the regiment to hold the line<br />
Lausdorn-Weiswampach-Beiler, which<br />
the 112th Infantry had just abandoned.<br />
Colonel Nelson at this moment had<br />
two contradictory orders and would<br />
have to risk his regiment if he carried<br />
out either.<br />
Through the roundabout artillery<br />
channels he <strong>as</strong>ked permission to join<br />
the 106th Infantry Division, only a little<br />
distance away to the north. Nelson<br />
also reported to General Jones at Vielsalm<br />
and set the problem before him.<br />
Jones attached the 112th Infantry to<br />
his own division on the spot, <strong>as</strong>suring<br />
Nelson that he would <strong>as</strong>sume full responsibility.<br />
The sequence of events in<br />
17 Cota w<strong>as</strong> acting on orders from the VIII<br />
Corps commander who wished to deny the enemy<br />
the use of Highway N 26, the main paved road<br />
from the south into St. Vith.<br />
this story of difficulties in command and<br />
communication is none too clear, but<br />
the VIII Corps commander approved the<br />
attachment. On the morning of the 20th<br />
Jones ordered the regiment to sideslip<br />
back to the e<strong>as</strong>t, reoccupy Beiler, and<br />
dig in along the e<strong>as</strong>t-west ridge line,<br />
Leithum-Beiler-Malscheid. Thus de-<br />
ployed on the right of the 424th Infan-<br />
try, the 112th w<strong>as</strong> another piece filling<br />
out the f<strong>as</strong>t developing “island defense”<br />
of St. Vith.<br />
The Fall of Wiltz<br />
The total impact of the severe Ger-<br />
man blows dealt the 110th Infantry in<br />
the late afternoon and evening of 17<br />
December w<strong>as</strong> not felt at the division<br />
and corps headquarters for several hours.<br />
Information on the hard-pressed battal-<br />
ions and their companies w<strong>as</strong> sketchy<br />
and secondhand. At 2013 General Cota<br />
phoned the VIII Corps commander to<br />
say that the situation w<strong>as</strong> critical, that<br />
routes were open for the German tanks<br />
to come through, and that “t<strong>here</strong> is<br />
some question in regard to the 110th<br />
Infantry CP.” He added, however, that<br />
he had “three battalions now trying<br />
to counterattack from Clerf to Mar-<br />
nach.” (By this hour, of course, the<br />
story w<strong>as</strong> quite different: the 1st Bat-<br />
talion w<strong>as</strong> cut to pieces, most of the<br />
2d Battalion w<strong>as</strong> surrounded, and the<br />
3d Battalion w<strong>as</strong> holding at Consthum<br />
and Hosingen only by the skin of its<br />
teeth.)<br />
The corps commander w<strong>as</strong> loath to<br />
yield ground to the enemy. Nonethe-<br />
less he advised Cota to withdraw the<br />
110th back of the Clerf, that “under the<br />
circumstances it w<strong>as</strong> necessary.” Further-<br />
more, Middleton instructed Cota to use
206 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
his tanks and tank destroyers to block<br />
the roads west of the river.<br />
The 28th Division commander agreed<br />
to pull back w<strong>here</strong> he could, but by<br />
the morning of the 18th it w<strong>as</strong> apparent<br />
that to re-establish any sort of front be-<br />
hind the Clerf w<strong>as</strong> impossible. The<br />
bridges at Clerf and Wilwerwiltz were<br />
in German hands (no preparations had<br />
been made to destroy them); most of<br />
the sixty tanks committed in the central<br />
sector were destroyed. No help could<br />
be expected from either the right or left<br />
wing regiments in shoring up the divi-<br />
sion center. The 109th Infantry w<strong>as</strong><br />
losing ground on its north flank and soon<br />
would be forced back fanwise into the<br />
9th Armored Division zone. The 112th<br />
Infantry south wing w<strong>as</strong> giving way un-<br />
der heavy attack, and during the day all<br />
communications between the regiment<br />
and division were lost.<br />
Miscellaneous troops of the 110th In-<br />
fantry had joined with units of Com-<br />
bat Command R of the 9th Armored<br />
Division (briefly under operational con-<br />
trol of the 28th Infantry Division) to<br />
defend along the main road to B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
in the area west of Clerf. The respon-<br />
sibility for command <strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sumed<br />
directly by the VIII Corps. General<br />
Cota, <strong>as</strong> a result, decided to concen-<br />
trate what w<strong>as</strong> left to him-headquar-<br />
ters troops, engineers, stragglers, and<br />
the handful of organized units moving<br />
back from across the Clerf–in defense<br />
of Wiltz, the 28th Division command<br />
post. This sizable town lay in a bend of<br />
the Wiltz River valley, southwest of<br />
Clerf and some three miles away from<br />
the enemy-held crossings at Wilwerwiltz.<br />
Next to the paved through highway via<br />
Clerf, the Wiltz valley offered the best<br />
avenue westward. The road center at<br />
Wiltz and the bridges t<strong>here</strong> were only<br />
about twelve miles from B<strong>as</strong>togne. It<br />
would be natural, t<strong>here</strong>fore, for the<br />
Germans debouching from the Wilwer-<br />
wiltz bridgehead to defile through the<br />
Wiltz valley.<br />
About 1000 on 18 December, Gen-<br />
eral Cota received the welcome word<br />
that a combat command of the 10th Ar-<br />
mored Division w<strong>as</strong> moving forward to<br />
his <strong>as</strong>sistance, probably to be in position<br />
to give support by the late afternoon.<br />
Middleton had ordered the 44th Engi-<br />
neer Combat Battalion (Lt. Col.<br />
Clarion J. Kjeldseth) to Wiltz on the<br />
previous evening with about six hundred<br />
men (it had been operating sawmills<br />
and rock crushers, working on roads,<br />
and the like). This unit now relieved<br />
the provisional battalion, h<strong>as</strong>tily formed<br />
from the 28th Division headquarters,<br />
by setting up positions north and e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the town. T<strong>here</strong> were also avail-<br />
able some tanks and guns to help the<br />
engineers, bandsmen, telephone line-<br />
men, and paym<strong>as</strong>ters who composed the<br />
defense. All that remained of the 707th<br />
Tank Battalion-some six crippled tanks<br />
and five <strong>as</strong>sault guns–w<strong>as</strong> gat<strong>here</strong>d<br />
in Wiltz after a rear guard action in<br />
Wilwerwiltz. Six three-inch towed tank<br />
destroyers from the 630th Tank De-<br />
stroyer Battalion, weapons of the 447th<br />
Antiaircraft Battalion, and light ar-<br />
mored cars of the 28th Reconnaissance<br />
Troop reinforced the perimeter.<br />
Southe<strong>as</strong>t of the town the undergunned<br />
batteries of the 687th Field Artillery<br />
Battalion held firing positions along the<br />
road, sited to cover the Wiltz perimeter<br />
or support the 3d Battalion, 110th In-<br />
fantry, fighting at Consthum.<br />
It will be recalled that the troops at<br />
Consthum held the 901st Panzer Grena-
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 207<br />
dier Regiment at bay until the after-<br />
noon of 18 December and, even <strong>as</strong> they<br />
withdrew, continued to block the road<br />
to Wiltz. The northern regiment of the<br />
Panzer Lehr Division, the 902d, made<br />
better progress. The capitulation of the<br />
gallant garrison at Hosingen, during<br />
the morning, removed this threat to<br />
the 902d supply road. The 26th Vollzs<br />
Grenadier Division, having completed its<br />
initial mission by seizing an undamaged<br />
bridge across the Clerf at Drauffelt dur-<br />
ing the night, made way for the Panzer<br />
Lehr Division to strike for B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The Panzer Lehr Reconnaissance Bat-<br />
talion, earlier withdrawn from the fight<br />
at Holzthum, reverted to its parent<br />
command and crossed the river first.<br />
The 902d, advancing by way of Muns-<br />
hausen, now cleared of Americans, fol-<br />
lowed. Despite har<strong>as</strong>sing fire from<br />
American guns and mortars the Ger-<br />
mans moved swiftly. At the crossroads<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Eschweiler the Reconnaissance<br />
Battalion turned to the left and bore<br />
down on Wiltz. The 902d, led in person<br />
by the division commander, continued<br />
toward the west, although briefly de-<br />
layed in a fight with a few towed anti-<br />
tank guns and armored cars near Esch-<br />
weiler. 18<br />
German field guns, by this time west<br />
of the Clerf, opened fire on Wiltz at<br />
noon. Two hours later tanks and self-<br />
propelled guns struck the 44th Engi-<br />
neers, which w<strong>as</strong> outposting the little<br />
hamlets northe<strong>as</strong>t of Wiltz. A section<br />
of tank destroyers, supporting the for-<br />
ward outpost, w<strong>as</strong> overrun by the more<br />
18 The Americans lost four tank destroyers and<br />
eight armored cars. It would appear they were<br />
surprised by the speed of the German advance;<br />
the enemy <strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong> being made by bicycle<br />
troops.<br />
mobile German tanks, but the engineers<br />
held their fire for the German infantry<br />
on the heels of the panzers and then<br />
cut loose, with satisfying results. The<br />
American howitzers, south of Wiltz, al-<br />
so took a hand in slowing the German<br />
attack. But the enemy armor weight w<strong>as</strong><br />
too heavy, nor could it be checked by<br />
the handful of tanks and light <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns remaining to the 707th Tank Bat-<br />
talion. By dusk the American line had<br />
been pushed back nearly to Wei-<br />
dingen when orders came to withdraw<br />
behind the Wiltz River and destroy<br />
the bridge at Weidingen. For some rea-<br />
son the bridge w<strong>as</strong> not blown. But the<br />
pressure on the Wiltz perimeter relaxed<br />
briefly <strong>as</strong> the Panzer Lehr Reconnais-<br />
sance Battalion turned back toward<br />
the north to rejoin its division in the<br />
race for B<strong>as</strong>togne. Infantry of the 26th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division took over the<br />
attack on the northe<strong>as</strong>t (probably the<br />
39th Volks Grenadier Regiment) .<br />
On German operations maps Wiltz<br />
lay athwart the boundary which divided<br />
the attack zones of the XLVII Panzer<br />
Corps and the LXXXV Corps. On<br />
19 December the right wing division<br />
of the latter, the 5th Parachute Divi-<br />
sion, took over the attack on Wiltz, or<br />
perhaps more accurately, drifted into a<br />
fight for the town. On the evening of<br />
the 18th Col. Ludwig Heilmann, com-<br />
mander of the 5th Parachute Division,<br />
knew that the divisions on his right<br />
and left were well ahead of his<br />
own. In fact the troops of the 26th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division sent against<br />
Wiltz from the northe<strong>as</strong>t were acting<br />
under orders to protect the flank and<br />
rear of Panzer Lehr against possible<br />
American counterattack from the Wiltz<br />
valley. Heilmann, t<strong>here</strong>fore, had decid-
208 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
ed to byp<strong>as</strong>s Wiltz on 19 December with<br />
his entire division but now found that<br />
he could not get his regiments back in<br />
hand. The 5th Parachute Division commander<br />
had already experienced great<br />
difficulty in maintaining control of his<br />
units in action. His staff and regimental<br />
commanders, appointees of Generaloberst<br />
Kurt Student, had formed a<br />
clique against the previous commander<br />
and were hostile to Heilmann. 19 Furthermore,<br />
troops and troop leaders were<br />
poorly trained, coming <strong>as</strong> they had only<br />
recently from Luftwaffe ground units.<br />
Even on the first day of the offensive<br />
one of Heilmann’s regiments had been<br />
lost for several hours. This experience,<br />
events would show, had borne little<br />
fruit.<br />
On the morning of 19 December the<br />
headquarters of the 28th Infantry<br />
Division transferred from Wiltz to Sibret,<br />
southwest of B<strong>as</strong>togne. The provisional<br />
battalion which had been recruited<br />
from the headquarters staff remained<br />
in Wiltz. Meanwhile General<br />
Cota had ordered Colonel Strickler to<br />
move in the 3d Battalion, 110th Infantry,<br />
from Nocher. The battalion, perhaps<br />
200 strong, arrived in Wiltz about<br />
noon and Strickler <strong>as</strong>sumed command<br />
of the forces in the town. During the<br />
morning the 26th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
engaged in desultory action, moving<br />
troops around to the north. Since the<br />
Wiltz bridge had not been destroyed,<br />
the American <strong>as</strong>sault gun platoon w<strong>as</strong><br />
ordered back to Erpeldange, covering<br />
19 The so-called Parachute <strong>Army</strong> had developed<br />
originally <strong>as</strong> a partisan and personal creation of<br />
Goering. As a result it w<strong>as</strong> ridden with politics.<br />
The account of Heilmann’s difficulties is in MS<br />
# B–023, 5th Parachute Division, 1 December<br />
1944–12 January 1945 (Generalmajor Ludwig<br />
Heilmann) .<br />
the northe<strong>as</strong>tern approach to the bridge<br />
and the engineer outposts. Four of<br />
the 707th tanks that had been crippled<br />
the previous day were drawn up on the<br />
ridge e<strong>as</strong>t of Wiltz to give what help<br />
they might <strong>as</strong> more or less stationary<br />
artillery. The Americans were not too<br />
worried by the flanking move because<br />
tanks of the 10th Armored Division<br />
were expected momentarily.<br />
The German infantry on the north<br />
side of town aligned for the <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
about 1400. A sharp attack drove a pro-<br />
visional platoon, made up from the 28th<br />
Division band, off the high ground to<br />
the northwest, thus exposing the engi-<br />
neer line. The 44th w<strong>as</strong> hit from the<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t and e<strong>as</strong>t by infantry armed<br />
with machine pistols charging in along-<br />
side single tanks. As American riflemen<br />
and machine gunners cut down the Ger-<br />
man <strong>as</strong>sault teams, they saw their own<br />
ranks thinning. In this fight the cross-<br />
roads near Erpeldange changed hands<br />
four times. The <strong>as</strong>sault gun platoon<br />
gave good support w<strong>here</strong>ver the line<br />
w<strong>as</strong> threatened, but by the end of the<br />
afternoon its fuel and ammunition<br />
were nearly gone and the gunners, after<br />
four days of nearly continuous action,<br />
were approaching complete exhaustion.<br />
When darkness finally came, the 44th<br />
withdrew with the <strong>as</strong>sault guns into<br />
Wiltz, having lost four officers and 150<br />
men. This time the bridge w<strong>as</strong> blown.<br />
On orders, the three remaining <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns went back to cover the wrecked<br />
structure. Their fate is unknown.<br />
While elements of the 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division were attacking on<br />
the north side of the Wiltz, detachments<br />
of the 5th Parachute Division struck the<br />
American perimeter on the south and<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t. This timing might seem to
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 209<br />
indicate a co-ordinated attack. In fact<br />
it represented Heilmann’s failure to<br />
gain control of his division, for the or-<br />
ders were to byp<strong>as</strong>s Wiltz. The division<br />
advance guard from the 15th Parachute<br />
Regiment (supposedly on its way to<br />
capture Sibret) somehow became con-<br />
fused, wandered away northward, and<br />
about 1500 struck the 687th Field Artil-<br />
lery Battalion, whose batteries had dis-<br />
placed to a road angling southe<strong>as</strong>t from<br />
the town. 20 Battery A met the tanks<br />
leading the German column with direct<br />
fire, disabled or destroyed them, and<br />
briefly slowed the advance toward Wiltz.<br />
But menaced <strong>as</strong> they were, the artil-<br />
lery commander could not risk his how-<br />
itzers further. Battery B fired its few<br />
remaining rounds to cover the other bat-<br />
teries, the battalion <strong>as</strong>sembling during<br />
the evening at a crossroad southe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Harlange.<br />
By nightfall the American perimeter<br />
had been pierced at many points and<br />
the defenders pushed back into the cen-<br />
ter of Wiltz. Most of the tanks and<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns were out of action, t<strong>here</strong><br />
were insufficient machine guns to cover<br />
the final protective line, radio commun-<br />
ication between the desperate units w<strong>as</strong><br />
practically nonexistent, searchlight rays<br />
glancing from the low clouds lighted<br />
the path of the attackers, and ammuni-<br />
tion w<strong>as</strong> running very low.<br />
Attempts during the evening to send a<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force of stragglers and trains for-<br />
ward from the 28th Division headquar-<br />
20 The American infantry gave high praise to<br />
the 687th for its part in this fight. Colonel Strick-<br />
ler later said of the gunners, “a magnificent job<br />
by some magnificent men.” Recognized <strong>as</strong> out-<br />
standing even in this band w<strong>as</strong> S/Sgt. William J.<br />
Bennett of Battery C, who w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.<br />
ters at Sibret were abortive; the roads<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t to Wiltz now were blocked every<br />
few kilometers by enemy infantry and<br />
self-propelled guns.<br />
On the ridges which look down over<br />
Wiltz more Germans appeared in the<br />
early evening, apparently eager to be<br />
in at the kill. The 14th Parachute Regi-<br />
ment, which had been moving slowly<br />
westward (the 5th Parachute Division<br />
commander <strong>as</strong>cribed its dilatory move-<br />
ment to the habit of attacking small<br />
villages in order to have billets for the<br />
cold December nights), entered the<br />
fight via a climb onto the e<strong>as</strong>tern ridge<br />
overlooking the town. At le<strong>as</strong>t a third<br />
of the 5th Parachute Division w<strong>as</strong> finally<br />
engaged at Wiltz contrary to Heilmann’s<br />
orders.<br />
Colonel Strickler decided to evacuate<br />
Wiltz by infiltration and regroup at<br />
Sibret, but with the Germans pressing<br />
in from all sides and no means of reach-<br />
ing his units except by runner the actual<br />
withdrawal would be difficult to control.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> his intention, however, to move<br />
the provisional battalion first, leaving<br />
the 3d Battalion to keep the escape<br />
exits open while the 44th Engineers<br />
acted <strong>as</strong> rear guard. The 687th Field Ar-<br />
tillery Battalion pulled out to the south-<br />
west and the 3d Battalion also started<br />
to move, under the impression that this<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the plan. When orders finally ar-<br />
rived to hold in place, the 3d Battalion<br />
had reached a trident crossroad south-<br />
west of the town. After a long wait the<br />
battalion commanding officer, Major<br />
Milton, went back into Wiltz to get fur-<br />
ther orders; when he returned most of<br />
his battalion had disappeared. With the<br />
few troops remaining, Milton succes-<br />
fully made his way cross-country to the<br />
west.
210<br />
The bulk of the provisional battalion,<br />
inside Wiltz, started southwest an hour<br />
or so before midnight, some on foot, the<br />
rest riding on trucks, half-tracks, and<br />
tank destroyers. A few hundred yards<br />
had been traversed when, at the first<br />
crossroad, the leading half-track ran into<br />
a patch of mines laid in front of a Ger-<br />
man roadblock and exploded. An un-<br />
identified crew of a 447th Antiaircraft<br />
Artillery half-track drove straight onto<br />
the mines, its .50-caliber fire searching<br />
out the enemy riflemen. The half-track<br />
w<strong>as</strong> demolished, but the field had been<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
WILTZ<br />
exploded and the covering infantry<br />
cleared away.<br />
As the column turned northwest on<br />
the main B<strong>as</strong>togne highway enemy fire<br />
incre<strong>as</strong>ed; some in the column turned<br />
back from the gantlet in hopes of finding<br />
another escape route by retracing their<br />
steps through Wiltz. About four and a<br />
half miles west of the town, a second<br />
block w<strong>as</strong> encountered and a German<br />
self-propelled gun l<strong>as</strong>hed out at the lead<br />
vehicles while machine gunners blazed<br />
away from positions around it. A platoon<br />
of Negro troops came to the head of the
FIFTH PANZER ARMY ATTACKS 28TH INFANTRY DIVISION 211<br />
column and, attacking through the dark<br />
with grenades and bayonets, cleared the<br />
position.<br />
Only a short distance beyond, at<br />
a third block, fire swept into the col-<br />
umn from all sides. This w<strong>as</strong> the end:<br />
shots, blazing vehicles, and screaming<br />
wounded. Those who could left the road,<br />
scattering in small parties into the dark.<br />
In the darkness and confusion many<br />
stragglers made their way into B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
and Vaux-lez-Rosières. (Strickler made<br />
it to the latter point w<strong>here</strong> General Cota<br />
placed him in charge of the defense.)<br />
Farther to the south the 687th Field<br />
Artillery Battalion w<strong>as</strong> surrounded at a<br />
crossroad about seven miles from Wiltz.<br />
The gunners and their attached antiair-<br />
craft artillery unit made a stand with<br />
their carbines, Colts, and a few .50-cali-<br />
ber machine guns. For nearly two hours<br />
enemy flares methodically picked out<br />
targets for mortar and bullet fire, while<br />
the Americans were so closely beset that<br />
the Bofors and murderous quad mounts<br />
could not retaliate without cutting down<br />
their own people. Only three of the<br />
howitzers left could be withdrawn and<br />
losses among the cannoneers and drivers<br />
were high. The 44th Combat Engineers,<br />
the rear guard unit at Wiltz, probably<br />
suffered most, the enemy accounting for<br />
18 officers and 160 men during the final<br />
withdrawal.<br />
The fall of Wiltz ended the 28th Divi-<br />
sion's delaying action before B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Other American troops now had to take<br />
over the actual defense of that all-im-<br />
portant road center, but without the<br />
gallant bargain struck by the 110th In-<br />
fantry and its allied units–men for<br />
time–the German plans for a coup-de-<br />
main at B<strong>as</strong>togne would have turned to<br />
accomplished fact. 21 The cost had been<br />
high, much higher than American units<br />
expected to pay at this stage of the war:<br />
the 110th Infantry virtually destroyed,<br />
the men and fighting vehicles of five<br />
tank companies lost, the equivalent of<br />
three combat engineer companies dead<br />
or missing, and tank destroyer, artillery,<br />
and miscellaneous units engulfed in this<br />
battle. In the l<strong>as</strong>t analysis the losses in-<br />
flicted on the enemy may have equaled<br />
those sustained by the Americans–cer-<br />
tainly the Germans paid dearly for their<br />
hurried frontal attacks against stone-<br />
walled villages and towns–but the final<br />
me<strong>as</strong>ure of success and failure would be<br />
in terms of hours and minutes won by<br />
the Americans and lost to the enemy.<br />
21 This gallant feat w<strong>as</strong> recognized fully at the<br />
time by General Middleton and its importance<br />
later emph<strong>as</strong>ized in the VIII Corps after action<br />
report for December 1944.
CHAPTER IX<br />
The Attack by the German Left Wing<br />
16-20 December<br />
Hitler’s hope of victory rode with his<br />
two panzer armies. He w<strong>as</strong> confident<br />
that the Allies would not be able to re-<br />
act in a forceful way until these armies<br />
were across the Meuse and it would<br />
appear that he expected this reaction to<br />
take the form of a counterattack some-<br />
w<strong>here</strong> on the west bank of that river.<br />
Under no circumstances w<strong>as</strong> he pre-<br />
pared to diminish the main striking<br />
force in order to build up strong pro-<br />
tection for the German flanks during the<br />
advance e<strong>as</strong>t of the Meuse. The <strong>as</strong>sign-<br />
ment of four infantry divisions to cover<br />
the southern flank of the <strong>as</strong>sault armies<br />
w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> he would go, nor could the<br />
numerous ple<strong>as</strong> advanced by his field<br />
commanders for additional strength in<br />
the south alter his decision one whit.<br />
Despite the poverty of forces allotted<br />
Brandenberger’s Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, the<br />
Fuehrer w<strong>as</strong> prepared, <strong>as</strong> always, to ex-<br />
pect the impossible. At one point in the<br />
planning period Hitler envisaged these<br />
four divisions <strong>as</strong> forming a blocking line<br />
all the way from the German frontier to<br />
Charleville on the Meuse. Both Jodl and<br />
Model resisted this idea, but when the<br />
counteroffensive began t<strong>here</strong> were still<br />
rather vague plans afoot for employing<br />
the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> in a push west and<br />
south to form a position b<strong>as</strong>ed on Lux-<br />
embourg City, Arlon, and Neufchâteau.<br />
Hitler likewise attempted to intervene<br />
in the initial <strong>as</strong>sault plans of the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> by directing that the attack would<br />
start <strong>as</strong> a pincers move in which one<br />
prong shot west out of Trier and the<br />
other penetrated northwest of Echter-<br />
nach. Jodl and Model again acted <strong>as</strong> a<br />
team in killing this idea, pointing out<br />
that the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> had neither the<br />
troops nor the guns to support two<br />
separate attacks. It is clear that through-<br />
out the planning ph<strong>as</strong>e Jodl took a<br />
realistic view of the limited capability<br />
of Brandenberger’s army. After the war<br />
he admitted that the Wehrmachtfueh-<br />
rungsstab would have been satisfied to<br />
see the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> advance only half<br />
the distance between Echternach and<br />
Luxembourg City. 1<br />
When Brandenberger and his chief of<br />
staff, Generalmajor Rudolf Freiherr von<br />
Gersdorff, finally were allowed to map<br />
their own scheme of maneuver they<br />
settled on a containing mission for the<br />
two infantry divisions in the left corps<br />
(General der Infanterie Franz Beyer’s<br />
LXXX Corps), and an advance by the<br />
two infantry divisions on the right which<br />
comprised General der Infanterie Bap-<br />
tist Kniess’s LXXXV Corps. Beyer’s<br />
troops, in this final plan, had the mission<br />
1 ETHINT–51, OKW, Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive (Gen-<br />
eraloberst Alfred Jodl) .
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 213<br />
of establishing a bridgehead at Echter-<br />
nach on the Sauer River, then undertak-<br />
ing a limited advance to the southwest.<br />
The LXXXV Corps w<strong>as</strong> given orders to<br />
cross the Our River, north of its juncture<br />
with the Sauer, and advance on a west-<br />
ward axis parallel to that of the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. If all went well one of the<br />
two divisions would come to a halt in a<br />
blocking position around Arlon, south of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Brandenberger would have to rely in<br />
the main on his artillery if the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> to hold its position at the<br />
shoulder of the counteroffensive against<br />
any strong attack from the south. One of<br />
the first objectives, t<strong>here</strong>fore, would be<br />
to neutralize or destroy the American<br />
artillery groupments, and for this pur-<br />
pose the army w<strong>as</strong> given a few batteries<br />
of the new, long-range 120-mm. guns.<br />
The total artillery strength available in<br />
the army w<strong>as</strong> 319 guns and 108 rocket<br />
projectors. When it came to close and<br />
mobile support for the <strong>as</strong>sault Branden-<br />
berger’s divisions would be in a bad way;<br />
t<strong>here</strong> were only thirty <strong>as</strong>sault guns in<br />
the army and half of these were with<br />
the 5th Parachute Division on the right<br />
wing.<br />
At 0530 on the morning of 16 Decem-<br />
ber the guns and rocket projectors of the<br />
German Seventh <strong>Army</strong> opened fire, sig-<br />
naling the attack across the Our and<br />
Sauer Rivers. The sector in which the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> would advance, <strong>as</strong> flank<br />
guard for the two panzer armies carrying<br />
the weight of the main counteroffensive,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> weakly held. Only small local re-<br />
serves were at hand to reinforce the<br />
v<strong>as</strong>tly outnumbered American troops<br />
facing the four divisions under General<br />
Brandenberger’s command. The north-<br />
ern limit of the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> attack<br />
coincided with the north boundary of<br />
the 109th Infantry Regiment (28th In-<br />
fantry Division) near Stolzembourg; its<br />
southern limit w<strong>as</strong> roughly the same <strong>as</strong><br />
the southern boundary of the 12th In-<br />
fantry Regiment (4th Infantry Division)<br />
near the confluence of the Sauer and<br />
Moselle Rivers.<br />
Along this winding front, a distance<br />
of some thirty miles, the opponents<br />
would be matched at the first shock<br />
approximately <strong>as</strong> follows. On the north<br />
wing of the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> the 5th Para-<br />
chute Division would cross the Our and<br />
strike the 2d Battalion of the 109th In-<br />
fantry. The boundary between the 109th<br />
and 110th ran obliquely, however, and<br />
in consequence the 5th Parachute<br />
would shortly engage troops of the latter<br />
regiment. Next in line on the Our the<br />
352d Volks Grenadier Division would<br />
cross into the zone held by the 3d Bat-<br />
talion of the 109th. South of the village<br />
of Wallendorf, w<strong>here</strong> the Our flows into<br />
the Sauer, the 276th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division would push into the narrow<br />
segment of the Sauer front held by the<br />
60th Armored Infantry Battalion of the<br />
9th Armored Division (-), then fan out<br />
against the left flank of the 12th Infantry.<br />
The 212th Volks Grenadier Division,<br />
acting <strong>as</strong> the southern pivot for the entire<br />
German counteroffensive, would cross<br />
the Sauer in the Echternach sector and<br />
drive head on against the 12th Infantry. 2<br />
(Map V)<br />
2 The chief German source for the Seventh <strong>Army</strong><br />
operations is MS # A–876, Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive of<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, 16 December 1944–25 January 1945<br />
(General der Panzertruppen Erich Branden-<br />
berger). The corps accounts are in MSS #<br />
B–030, LXXXV Corps, 1 December 1944–10 Janu-<br />
ary 1945 (General der Infanterie Baptist Kniess)<br />
and B–081, LXXX Corps, 13 September 1944–23<br />
March 1945, Part Two (General der Infanterie<br />
Dr. Franz Beyer). The individual divisions are
214<br />
The 109th Infantry Defense on the<br />
Sauer and Our Rivers<br />
16–20 December<br />
The 109th Infantry, led by Lt. Col.<br />
James E. Rudder, a former Ranger com-<br />
mander, w<strong>as</strong> close to full strength, al-<br />
though, like the rest of the 28th Divi-<br />
sion, its rifle companies were filled by<br />
replacements with limited experience<br />
and training. The division commander<br />
had considered that the enemy might<br />
make a “distracting” attack toward Die-<br />
kirch and Ettelbruck, in an attempt to<br />
cut the road and rail lines running north<br />
from the city of Luxembourg, and had<br />
disposed the 109th accordingly. On the<br />
division south flank, the 3d Battalion<br />
(Lt. Col. Jim H. McCoy) w<strong>as</strong> allotted<br />
a four-mile front, but had concentrated<br />
men and weapons in an almost contin-<br />
uous 3,000-yard defense line along the<br />
heights in the triangle formed by the<br />
Our and Sauer Rivers which overlooked<br />
the valley road west to Ettelbruck. On<br />
this road the 1st Battalion (Lt. Col.<br />
H. R. Williams) lay in reserve at Die-<br />
kirch, with two field artillery battalions,<br />
the 107th and 108th, emplaced close to<br />
that town. The 2d Battalion sector to<br />
the north w<strong>as</strong> over five miles in width.<br />
In this weak portion of the line, defense<br />
w<strong>as</strong> b<strong>as</strong>ed on two strongpoints of rifle<br />
company strength, one on a ridge road<br />
about a mile and a half west of Vianden<br />
covered in MSS # A–930, A–931, 212th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division–Ardennes, 16 December 1944–25<br />
January 1945 (Generalleutnant Franz Sensfuss) ;<br />
B–023 (Heilmann) ; B–067, 352d Volks Grenadier<br />
Division, 16 December 1944–25 January 1945 (Gen-<br />
eralmajor Erich Schmidt) ; B–073 212th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, Ardennes (Generalleutnant<br />
Franz Sensfuss) ; and P–032f, Ardennes Project<br />
(Generalmajor Hugo Dempwolff). LIII Corps’ KTB<br />
covers the first hours of action but ends with 17<br />
December.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
and the Our River, the other at Führen<br />
about a mile from the river. These<br />
strongpoints were nearly two miles<br />
apart; behind them the third rifle com-<br />
pany w<strong>as</strong> located in reserve at Branden-<br />
burg with one howitzer battery to give<br />
support. Some distance back from the<br />
river the 2d Battalion (Maj. William J.<br />
Maroney) maintained a series of seven<br />
outposts watching the German fortifica-<br />
tions on the e<strong>as</strong>tern bank.<br />
During the two nights prior to 16<br />
December the 5th Parachute Division<br />
moved its regiments into these e<strong>as</strong>t bank<br />
fortifications and the extensive woods<br />
which lay just to the rear. The 5th Para-<br />
chute Division had its full complement<br />
of officers and men, but lacked its anti-<br />
tank battalion (which had lost much<br />
equipment to air attack en route from<br />
Holland) and its mortar battalion. Colo-<br />
nel Heilmann, who had recently taken<br />
over the division, w<strong>as</strong> not too sanguine <strong>as</strong><br />
to its ability or state of training <strong>as</strong> a unit.<br />
He relied on the 15th Parachute Regi-<br />
ment, the 5th Parachute Engineer Bat-<br />
talion, and the attached 11th Assault<br />
Gun Brigade, which were well trained<br />
and motorized, to furnish the main<br />
striking force. The division artillery<br />
lacked the motors to accompany a rapid<br />
advance, and fire support would be given<br />
by the <strong>as</strong>sault guns and a regiment of<br />
Volks artillery. The latter w<strong>as</strong> horse-<br />
drawn but expected to motorize with<br />
captured American vehicles.<br />
Only a few days before the attack<br />
Heilmann warned Model that the 5th<br />
Parachute Division w<strong>as</strong> only a Cl<strong>as</strong>s IV<br />
outfit, but Model, who by now must have<br />
been surfeited with complaints on lack<br />
of equipment and insufficient training,<br />
merely replied that success would be won<br />
by the paratroopers’ “usual audacity.”
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 215<br />
Perhaps Model did not care to recognize<br />
that the paratroopers in this once elite<br />
division had been replaced by meagerly<br />
trained Luftwaffe ground troops and<br />
Navy battalions. Lacking experienced<br />
fighting men and the heavy weapons<br />
requisite for close support, Heilmann in-<br />
structed his line officers to avoid pitched<br />
battles for defended positions. After all,<br />
the goal to be reached by the night of<br />
16 December w<strong>as</strong> near the town of Wiltz<br />
some ten miles west of the Our. T<strong>here</strong>-<br />
fore the 5th Parachute Division plan<br />
called for a quick and unopposed cross-<br />
ing at the Our; a bridge to be in at Roth<br />
by midafternoon of the first day; a rapid<br />
advance p<strong>as</strong>t the villages w<strong>here</strong> the weak<br />
American forces were located; and a<br />
lightning stroke to force the crossing sites<br />
near Wiltz.<br />
If this plan were successful the 5th<br />
Parachute Engineer Battalion would<br />
ferry the <strong>as</strong>sault companies across the<br />
Our, then join the advance and reach the<br />
Wiltz sector with ferrying equipment by<br />
the end of the first day. The 14th Para-<br />
chute Regiment had orders to cross the<br />
Our in the north near Stolzembourg,<br />
drive p<strong>as</strong>t Putscheid and seize a crossing<br />
point on the Wiltz someplace west of<br />
Hoscheid. <strong>To</strong> the south the 15th Para-<br />
chute Regiment w<strong>as</strong> intended to cross<br />
the Our at Roth (named <strong>as</strong> the main<br />
divisional bridge site), seize the high<br />
ground near Vianden, then establish a<br />
bridgehead over the Sure at Bourscheid.<br />
The t<strong>as</strong>k of er<strong>as</strong>ing such American units<br />
<strong>as</strong> might be left in the towns and villages<br />
w<strong>as</strong> given the 13th Parachute Regiment,<br />
which had no transport and would be<br />
brought forward with the bulk of the<br />
heavy weapons once the Our bridge w<strong>as</strong><br />
in. Since the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> had ordered<br />
each of its divisions to commence the<br />
attack with only two battalions, spear-<br />
headed by single shock companies, the<br />
initial transfer to the far bank of the Our<br />
would be a gradual process (and would,<br />
<strong>as</strong> it proved, lead the Americans to be-<br />
lieve that the first Germans across were<br />
only patrols) . Nonetheless, Heilmann<br />
hoped that the vehicles of the 13th<br />
Parachute Regiment and the self-<br />
propelled 75-mm. guns of the 11th As-<br />
sault Gun Brigade would be across the<br />
Our River before the close of the first<br />
day, for he counted on these two units<br />
to lead the advance to the division ob-<br />
jective south of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The second German division <strong>as</strong>sem-<br />
bled opposite the 109th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
352d Volks Grenadier Division (Col.<br />
Erich Schmidt) . The boundary point be-<br />
tween the latter and its northern neigh-<br />
bor w<strong>as</strong> fixed about a half-mile south of<br />
Roth, but for some re<strong>as</strong>on the precise<br />
extension of the boundary line west of<br />
the Our had not been settled. As a result<br />
complications would arise once the 5th<br />
Parachute Division and the 352d Volks<br />
Grenadier Division advanced beyond the<br />
river. The 352d had full ranks, mostly<br />
from the Luftwaffe and Navy, but lacked<br />
training and veteran noncoms. Its artil-<br />
lery regiment contained four battalions,<br />
but w<strong>as</strong> mostly horse-drawn and woefully<br />
short of radio equipment. T<strong>here</strong> were<br />
only six <strong>as</strong>sault guns in the divisional<br />
company. On the night of 12 December<br />
the 352d pulled out of the long line be-<br />
tween Stolzembourg and Bollendorf<br />
which then comprised the division front<br />
and re-formed in the woods e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
Our, leaving only a small security force<br />
to screen the movements of the divisions<br />
moving up on the right and left. When<br />
the 109th Infantry sent a large combat<br />
patrol across at Vianden on the morning
216<br />
of the 14th, the Americans t<strong>here</strong>fore<br />
found no enemy.<br />
The night before the attack the 352d<br />
marched back to the new and narrow<br />
sector on the river from which the jump-<br />
off would be made: the 915th Regiment<br />
on the right, the 916th on the left, and<br />
the 914th, which had furnished the cov-<br />
ering force, in reserve. Thus poised, the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault regiments would cross the Our on<br />
either side of Gentingen, with orders to<br />
byp<strong>as</strong>s defended villages, seize the dom-<br />
inant heights in the Sauer-Our triangle,<br />
and drive <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the Sauer bridges at<br />
Ettelbruck–all this on the first day of the<br />
attack. In total, then, two German divi-<br />
sions and the metal of the LXXXV<br />
Corps’ artillery were to be thrown<br />
against the 109th Infantry and neighbor-<br />
ing troops of the 110th Infantry in the<br />
first hours of the great counteroffensive.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> were nearly three hundred<br />
tubes and projectors in the LXXXV<br />
Corps groupment which opened fire at<br />
0530 on 16 December. These pieces were<br />
laid on targets deep in the 109th In-<br />
fantry zone: notably Diekirch, B<strong>as</strong>ten-<br />
dorf, the ridge road running north from<br />
Ettelbruck across the rear of the 28th<br />
Division, and the command posts of the<br />
two artillery battalions. It would seem<br />
that the German gunners were firing by<br />
the map (t<strong>here</strong> had been numerous<br />
changes of position in this area which<br />
were unknown to German intelligence)<br />
and the opening barrage shortly dwin-<br />
dled away to occ<strong>as</strong>ional salvos without<br />
inflicting much damage or disrupting<br />
communications. ‘With the first sound of<br />
gunfire the <strong>as</strong>sault companies pushed<br />
their rubber boats into the Our, only<br />
some fifty feet wide, and the engineers<br />
began swinging the portable infantry<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
bridges into position over the shallow<br />
but turbulent river.<br />
The 109th outposts on the far bank<br />
of the Our could see little in the half-<br />
light of the foggy morning. Some were<br />
quietly byp<strong>as</strong>sed <strong>as</strong> the German shock<br />
companies moved quickly inland.<br />
Others, closer to the crossing sites, were<br />
<strong>as</strong>saulted by small detachments. Thus<br />
the 5th Parachute Division engineers<br />
wiped out the 2d Battalion outpost in<br />
the château ruins at Vianden before any<br />
warning could be sent out. The Amer-<br />
icans fired flares onto the e<strong>as</strong>t bank in an<br />
attempt to discover the purpose be-<br />
hind the heavy concentration of<br />
German artillery, but no certain<br />
word of enemy troops reached the<br />
109th command post at Ettelbruck<br />
until about 0900 when Company B re-<br />
ported that a 20-man patrol had <strong>as</strong>-<br />
saulted the outpost near Hosdorf. This<br />
advance detachment of the 916th Regi-<br />
ment had hit head on into the contin-<br />
uous and strongly defended right flank<br />
position of the 109th Infantry on the<br />
heights at the Sauer-Our triangle. By<br />
this time, however, the German advance<br />
parties farther north had p<strong>as</strong>sed through<br />
the weak outpost line and were gathering<br />
strength and momentum.<br />
The situation in the 109th area devel-<br />
oped <strong>as</strong> follows. The 14th Regiment,<br />
composing the right of the 5th Parachute<br />
Division advance, w<strong>as</strong> moving along the<br />
boundary between the 110th and the<br />
109th without much opposition. In ac-<br />
tual fact this regiment would “lean” on<br />
the neighboring XLVII Panzer Corps,<br />
which had struck into the center of the<br />
28th Division, and through most of the<br />
day lagged while the Panzer Corps<br />
opened the way. <strong>To</strong> the south the 15th
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 217<br />
Regiment took advantage of the wide<br />
gap between the two strongpoints<br />
manned by Companies E and F of the<br />
109th, its leading battalion marching<br />
without a fight to Walsdorf, an unoccu-<br />
pied village about two miles from the<br />
river. This move particularly threatened<br />
Company F, which w<strong>as</strong> on the ridge road<br />
three miles north of B<strong>as</strong>tendorf (the 2d<br />
Battalion command post), and which<br />
represented the northern linchpin of the<br />
regiment. At 1000 Company G came up<br />
from reserve at Brandenburg and w<strong>as</strong><br />
put on the right of Company F.<br />
For some re<strong>as</strong>on the German force at<br />
Walsdorf did not press its advantage.<br />
The forward units of the 15th Regiment<br />
were out of contact with the rest of the<br />
5th Parachute Division, and the regi-<br />
mental commander had difficulty in<br />
holding his outfit together. At dusk, how-<br />
ever, a second German battalion had<br />
arrived at Walsdorf and w<strong>as</strong> committed<br />
to the southwest in a drive toward Bran-<br />
denburg, slipping through a wooded de-<br />
pression between Companies F and G.<br />
Colonel Rudder dispatched Company C<br />
from the reserve battalion at Diekirch to<br />
check this penetration. But the company<br />
reached Brandenburg shortly before<br />
midnight without encountering the Ger-<br />
mans.<br />
The 15th Regiment drive through<br />
Walsdorf marked the most extensive<br />
penetration of the 109th Infantry posi-<br />
tions on this first day. Farther south bat-<br />
tle had been joined in bitter but incon-<br />
clusive fighting. Company E, in Fuhren,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> byp<strong>as</strong>sed by the German first thrust<br />
to Walsdorf. This crossroads village lay<br />
athwart the main road leading west from<br />
the Roth bridgehead and furnished ob-<br />
servation for the American batteries<br />
firing on the crossing site. About 1100,<br />
detachments from the 15th Regiment in<br />
the north turned and brought Fuhren<br />
under small arms fire. Radio communi-<br />
cation with the menaced company w<strong>as</strong><br />
lost three hours later, but direct <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
failed to dislodge the Americans.<br />
Company E w<strong>as</strong> further isolated by the<br />
interposition of the 915th Regiment be-<br />
tween Fuhren and the 3d Battalion. The<br />
915th had crossed the Our near Bettel<br />
and moved swiftly and unopposed up<br />
the draws through the 2,000-yard gap be-<br />
tween Rudder’s 2d and 3d Battalions.<br />
Shortly after 1000 the German advance<br />
guard w<strong>as</strong> firing its burp guns into Bat-<br />
tery A, 108th Field Artillery, e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Diekirch. An hour or so before, the<br />
American gunners had seen figures mov-<br />
ing through the fog but mistook them<br />
for Americans. By noon the 915th Regi-<br />
ment held Longsdorf and Tandel, the<br />
latter two miles from the Our, and had<br />
patrols to the south only two thousand<br />
yards from the main supply road linking<br />
Diekirch and Bettendorf on which the<br />
3d Battalion, deployed facing the Our,<br />
depended.<br />
Colonel Rudder called on the meager<br />
armored reserve allotted him by Cota<br />
(the 1st Platoon of Company C, 707th<br />
Tank Battalion), sending it north from<br />
Diekirch about 1300 to check the 915th<br />
thrust. With the tanks went Company A,<br />
shortly followed by Company B, the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the reserve battalion. The fight<br />
through the afternoon w<strong>as</strong> hard and the<br />
Americans made little progress, but<br />
shortly before nightfall the counter-<br />
attack forged ahead; Company A and the<br />
medium tanks came to the edge of Longs-<br />
dorf and Company B occupied the high<br />
ground between that village and Tan-<br />
del. 3<br />
3 During the advance by Company A, ad Lt.
218 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
While the American counterattack<br />
pushed in against the south flank of the<br />
915th that regiment continued to work<br />
its way southwest through the darkness,<br />
establishing an advance position on the<br />
ridge overlooking B<strong>as</strong>tendorf. The ex-<br />
sailors who comprised this regiment had<br />
moved f<strong>as</strong>t and gained ground, but their<br />
commander had been wounded, their<br />
flanks were open, and communications<br />
with the rest of the 352d were uncertain.<br />
In fact this leading contingent of the<br />
915th had shot its bolt and for the next<br />
couple of days would take little part in<br />
the battle. Nonetheless the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> commander w<strong>as</strong> well ple<strong>as</strong>ed with<br />
the advance made by his right wing.<br />
The 916th Regiment found the going<br />
much more difficult than its northern sis-<br />
ter regiment. Its opponent, the 3d Bat-<br />
talion, w<strong>as</strong> deployed on what for this<br />
sector w<strong>as</strong> a narrow front, well dug in on<br />
the heights overlooking the Our and<br />
with its right flank protected by the<br />
Sauer. The initial German <strong>as</strong>sault near<br />
Hosdorf had provided the 109th with the<br />
first confirmation of an enemy advance<br />
west of the Our, but accomplished little<br />
else. From excellent observation on the<br />
heights the 107th and 108th Field Artil-<br />
lery Battalions brought the howitzers<br />
positioned near Diekirch into play, pin-<br />
ning the German shock troops to the<br />
river bank w<strong>here</strong> they remained for the<br />
rest of the day. True, one arm of the<br />
352d w<strong>as</strong> reaching north of the 3d Bat-<br />
Samuel Leo silenced two enemy machine guns<br />
with grenades and killed five Germans with his<br />
rifle. He w<strong>as</strong> given the DSC. On this day Pvt.<br />
J. W. Jones made a lone attack upon a machine<br />
gun which w<strong>as</strong> firing directly at him; he destroyed<br />
the weapon and its crew but then w<strong>as</strong> cut down<br />
by a second machine gun. Jones w<strong>as</strong> awarded the<br />
DSC.<br />
talion, but the latter still blocked the<br />
Sauer valley road and the direct ap-<br />
proach to Diekirch and the Ettelbruck<br />
bridges.<br />
The 109th Infantry had held its posi-<br />
tions in this first day, and Rudder saw no<br />
cause for alarm since he occupied good<br />
terrain. The hard fact remained that the<br />
German infantry, m<strong>as</strong>ked by the acci-<br />
dents of the rugged Our country, had<br />
achieved considerable success in exploit-<br />
ing the gaps between the village strong-<br />
points. Also, the German armored ve-<br />
hicles and heavy weapons, which had<br />
been observed just at dark <strong>as</strong>sembling<br />
across the river facing Führen, had yet to<br />
be encountered. The 109th commander,<br />
under orders from General Cota that<br />
“nobody comes back,” now had to re-<br />
store contact between his companies and<br />
get his regiment in position to meet the<br />
next enemy move. The regiment could<br />
expect little aid, for most of the slim<br />
reserves of the 28th Division would go<br />
to the hard-pressed 110th Infantry in the<br />
center. But the 109th had one paramount<br />
advantage in that the solid anchoring of<br />
its right flank on the natural barrier pro-<br />
vided by the Sauer permitted some free-<br />
dom to concentrate on restoring the situ-<br />
ation to the left. Colonel Rudder’s<br />
reserves consisted of Company A, 103d<br />
Engineer Battalion; Company C, 707th<br />
Tank Battalion; the towed 3-inch guns<br />
of Company A, 630th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion; and his regimental antitank<br />
company. By midnight a platoon of en-<br />
gineers and some tank destroyers were<br />
moving up to reinforce the attack<br />
through Longsdorf to relieve the com-<br />
pany at Führen. An additional tank<br />
platoon w<strong>as</strong> ready to add weight to a<br />
second thrust toward Fuhren by way of<br />
Tandel.
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 219<br />
At 0240 on the morning of 17 Decem-<br />
ber the division commander phoned<br />
Colonel Rudder and made an unex-<br />
pected demand on his reserves. What<br />
had happened w<strong>as</strong> this. On the pre-<br />
vious evening the force from the 5th<br />
Parachute Division which had been mov-<br />
ing along the boundary between the<br />
109th and 110th reached the primary<br />
ridge road (known to the Americans <strong>as</strong><br />
the Skyline Drive) which extended lat-<br />
erally across the 28th Division sector<br />
from Weiswampach to Ettelbruck. The<br />
5th Parachute had rafted some light field<br />
pieces and vehicles over the Our and a<br />
few self-propelled guns that had negoti-<br />
ated a way across on top of a weir near<br />
Vianden were sent down the road to<br />
Hoscheid. Meanwhile the left battalion<br />
of the 14th Regiment had been ordered<br />
to take Hoscheid. This movement in the<br />
dark appeared to pose a threat to cut<br />
off the 109th with an attack straight<br />
south to Ettelbruck.<br />
General Cota ordered the 109th com-<br />
mander to get a platoon of tanks, mount<br />
an infantry platoon on them, and “help<br />
out up north w<strong>here</strong> things are getting<br />
hot.” Rudder immediately dispatched<br />
this force, plus a few engineers, north-<br />
ward on the Skyline Drive. In the mean-<br />
time, however, the 2d Battalion of the<br />
14th Parachute Regiment had cut the<br />
road south of Hoscheid and the relief<br />
force w<strong>as</strong> checked within a thousand<br />
yards of the village by enemy fire con-<br />
centrated on a sharp bend in the road.<br />
Hoscheid w<strong>as</strong> garrisoned by part of the<br />
110th Infantry Antitank Company, six<br />
medium tanks mounting 105-mm.<br />
howitzers (which the 707th Tank Bat-<br />
talion had organized <strong>as</strong> an <strong>as</strong>sault gun<br />
platoon) and three regular mediums.<br />
Through most of the 17th the de-<br />
fenders held on against infantry attack<br />
from the west and German <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns attacking from the north on the<br />
Skyline Drive. Finally, about 1530, the<br />
Hoscheid garrison received orders to<br />
fight its way out and join the relief<br />
force. These orders came too late, for<br />
an hour and a half earlier this t<strong>as</strong>k force<br />
had been ordered to the aid of a bat-<br />
tery of the 107th Field Artillery north<br />
of Diekirch. In Hoscheid the tanks were<br />
running low on ammunition. When<br />
night fell they loaded on the foot soldiers<br />
and made a d<strong>as</strong>h south to the 687th<br />
Field Artillery command post at Lipper-<br />
scheid, w<strong>here</strong> they found that the bat-<br />
teries were in process of displacing<br />
across the Wiltz River. The Hoscheid de-<br />
fenders joined the withdrawal westward<br />
and subsequently reached the town of<br />
Wiltz, t<strong>here</strong> taking part in the defense<br />
of the 28th Division command post. The<br />
fight at Hoscheid, German prisoners<br />
later reported, had cost the <strong>as</strong>saulting<br />
battalion at le<strong>as</strong>t a hundred dead but,<br />
more, it had helped delay the 14th Para-<br />
chute Regiment advance to the Wiltz<br />
River.<br />
In the 109th sector proper the battle<br />
during 17 December turned on attempts<br />
to relieve Company E (Capt. R. W.<br />
Cureton) at the crossroads in Führen.<br />
The enemy w<strong>as</strong> determined to take this<br />
village, located <strong>as</strong> it w<strong>as</strong> on the bound-<br />
ary between the 5th Parachute Division<br />
and the 352d Volks Grenadier Division.<br />
Führen w<strong>as</strong> attacked during the day by<br />
troops of the 15th Parachute Regiment,<br />
the 915th Regiment, and the 914th Reg-<br />
iment. As might be expected t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
little co-ordination in this <strong>as</strong>sault; fur-<br />
thermore the Germans were forced to<br />
divert much strength to meet the twin-<br />
pronged American counterattack mov-
220<br />
ing on Fuhren from the south. At day-<br />
break Company A and its tank platoon<br />
resumed attempts 10 break through<br />
Longsdorf and open the road to Fuhren,<br />
but by 0845 mortar and machine gun<br />
fire had pinned down the infantry five<br />
hundred yards short of Longsdorf. Com-<br />
pany B, now missing the platoon sent<br />
with the Moscheid t<strong>as</strong>k force, moved a<br />
short distance along the road between<br />
Tandel and Fuhren but likewise w<strong>as</strong><br />
checked. The commander of Company<br />
C, 707th Tank Battalion, took two of his<br />
tanks from Longsdorf to aid the infantry<br />
beyond Tandel, but a strong German<br />
patrol slipped through a draw lying be-<br />
tween Companies A and B and am-<br />
bushed the tanks.<br />
This German force, finally amounting<br />
to a battalion of infantry and two tanks,<br />
moved south during the morning until<br />
it met the 109th Antitank Company,<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> dug in with a few engineers<br />
and a single 40-mm. Bofors w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
Tandel and Longsdorf roads met. The<br />
American 57-mm. antitank guns scored<br />
“many hits” on the German tanks, but<br />
<strong>as</strong> usual without effect, and two of the<br />
guns were lost. The enemy infantry<br />
proved more vulnerable, twenty-five be-<br />
ing captured and a large number killed.<br />
Although the penetration w<strong>as</strong><br />
checked, the dual attempt to relieve<br />
Fuhren made no headway. On the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
road Company A dwindled under bitter<br />
fire. By midafternoon it numbered only<br />
twenty-five men and an artillery ob-<br />
server commander <strong>as</strong> the single officer<br />
left. Company B again started up the<br />
Tandel-Fuhren road, but the Germans<br />
swept the road with bazooka and burp<br />
gun fire from the ridges on either side<br />
forcing the company to withdraw to<br />
Tandel and <strong>as</strong>k for more infantry. All<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
this while Company E had been under<br />
attack in Fuhren, but with its own fire<br />
greatly thickened by accurate artillery<br />
concentrations the company held the en-<br />
emy at bay. Late in the day Company<br />
E radioed for ammunition and rations.<br />
Colonel Rudder ordered a patrol sent<br />
from Tandel under cover of night to<br />
bring ammunition, but it failed to reach<br />
Fuhren.<br />
At other points the enemy strength<br />
incre<strong>as</strong>ed <strong>as</strong> the day wore on. The 352d<br />
Volks Grenadier Division succeeded in<br />
crossing a few tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns,<br />
<strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> more light artillery. With<br />
these heavy weapons the advance guard<br />
of the reserve regiment, the 914th, ap-<br />
peared on the west bank to take a hand<br />
in the fight. On the north flank of the<br />
109th Infantry a tank platoon attack e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Brandenburg had restored the con-<br />
nection between Companies F and G<br />
early in the morning. But <strong>as</strong> the day<br />
wore on German infantry and <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns poured into the Our bridgehead<br />
and across the open flanks of the two<br />
companies. Company F knocked out two<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns in a 5th Parachute column<br />
with bazooka fire. Near Brandenburg<br />
the American tank platoon destroyed<br />
four <strong>as</strong>sault guns belonging to the 352d.<br />
But the German march to the west con-<br />
tinued.<br />
In the 3d Battalion sector, on the ex-<br />
treme right flank, the enemy achieved<br />
little success during the day and Ger-<br />
man reports speak of “bloody fighting.”<br />
Having failed to take the heights by<br />
frontal <strong>as</strong>sault, the 916th Regiment<br />
started a flanking attack along the south<br />
bank of the Sauer, moving for this pur-<br />
pose into the zone of the 276th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, which thus far had<br />
been held in check around Reisdorf and
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 221<br />
Bigelbach. Although t<strong>here</strong> were no<br />
American troops in the Sauer valley,<br />
observers on the heights were able to<br />
follow every move of the 916th. One<br />
infantry officer, 1st Lt. E. L. Peer,<br />
Company L, adjusted the fire of the sup-<br />
porting howitzers “so effectively that an<br />
estimated enemy infantry battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
destroyed.” With good wire and radio<br />
communication, excellent observation<br />
and a wealth of targets, the two artillery<br />
battalions were able to fire 3,123 rounds<br />
on 17 December, contributing particular-<br />
ly to the defense of Fuhren and the<br />
checkmate of the flanking movement by<br />
the 916th.<br />
As the day progressed, however, the<br />
enemy spread through the rear are<strong>as</strong><br />
of the 109th and menaced the gun posi-<br />
tions west of the Diekirch-Hoscheid<br />
road. Battery A, 107th Field Artillery,<br />
for example, had been har<strong>as</strong>sed by fire<br />
from small groups of Germans since<br />
the previous midnight. By midafternoon<br />
the 2d Battalion of the 915th Regiment,<br />
which had byp<strong>as</strong>sed B<strong>as</strong>tendorf earlier,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> pressing in on that battery and Bat-<br />
tery A, 108th Field Artillery, em-<br />
placed nearby. The gunners, fighting <strong>as</strong><br />
infantry, first beat off the approaching<br />
Germans while a neighboring battery<br />
bl<strong>as</strong>ted the woods e<strong>as</strong>t of the road in<br />
which the enemy <strong>as</strong>sembled.<br />
Hard pressed <strong>as</strong> the day wore on, the<br />
gunners were relieved by a series of<br />
friendly sorties. Two motor carriages<br />
mounting quadruple .50-caliber machine<br />
guns (the M16) from the 447th Anti-<br />
aircraft Artillery Battalion were put on<br />
the Diekirch-Hoscheid road. One w<strong>as</strong><br />
crippled by enemy fire, its driver and<br />
loader wounded by a rifle grenade when<br />
it drove squarely into the files of Ger-<br />
man infantry on the road, guns blazing:<br />
but the other fought its way north to<br />
the beleaguered batteries. Lt. Col. James<br />
C. Rosborough, commanding officer of<br />
the 107th Field Artillery, meanwhile<br />
gat<strong>here</strong>d a scratch force and with it<br />
fought through to the howitzer posi-<br />
tions. (Rosborough w<strong>as</strong> awarded the Dis-<br />
tinguished Service Cross for gallantry in<br />
this action.) About the same time the<br />
tanks which had been in the Hoscheid<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force were ordered into the fight<br />
and rolled from the north in on the<br />
enemy. The batteries were saved, but<br />
the positions from which the gunners<br />
had given such heartening support to<br />
the 109th were no longer tenable.<br />
At the close of the second day the<br />
109th still w<strong>as</strong> holding tenaciously but<br />
against incre<strong>as</strong>ingly heavy attack. All its<br />
reserves were committed, and the larger<br />
part of the attached company from the<br />
630th Tank Destroyer Battalion had<br />
been called away to defend the 28th Di-<br />
vision command post at Wiltz. The gap<br />
between the 2d and 3d Battalions in the<br />
Longsdorf-Fuhren area had been<br />
widened while the enemy column in the<br />
north had driven deep between the<br />
109th and 110th.<br />
The German attacks suddenly gained<br />
strength on the night of 17 December.<br />
For two days the 5th Parachute Divi-<br />
sion had operated with only such<br />
heavy weapons <strong>as</strong> could be ferried<br />
across the Our or maneuvered over the<br />
Vianden wier, because for two days trou-<br />
ble had dogged the bridge builders at<br />
Roth. The selection of this particular<br />
site had been forced upon the German<br />
commander because it w<strong>as</strong> the only point<br />
at which the river had moderate banks<br />
that could be reached by a p<strong>as</strong>sable ap-<br />
proach road. On the e<strong>as</strong>t side of the<br />
river. however, American bombers had
222<br />
left a large bomb crater in the road<br />
close to the Our. No work could be done<br />
to fill the crater until the attack actually<br />
began on 16 December. Bridging equip-<br />
ment promised by the Seventh <strong>Army</strong><br />
had arrived late and inexperienced en-<br />
gineers had further delayed the con-<br />
struction. American artillery and mortar<br />
fire also played its part in har<strong>as</strong>sing the<br />
bridge builders.<br />
Finally, in the early evening of 17<br />
December, the bridge w<strong>as</strong> completed,<br />
and the bulk of the <strong>as</strong>sault gun brigade,<br />
the antitank battalion, and the vehicles<br />
of the 15th Parachute Regiment began<br />
to roll, the division artillery and trains<br />
lining up to await their turn. The 14th<br />
Parachute Regiment, badly disorganized<br />
in the series of village fights at Hoscheid<br />
and elsew<strong>here</strong>, w<strong>as</strong> pulled together and<br />
sent marching to the Clerf River. Here,<br />
during the night, the 14th made a cross-<br />
ing near Kautenbach, opening the way<br />
to Wiltz and the west for the main forces<br />
of the division. The higher German<br />
headquarters no longer expected any<br />
concerted resistance in front of the 5th<br />
Parachute Division and attached its im-<br />
mediate reserve, the 13th Parachute<br />
Regiment, to the neighboring division<br />
on the south.<br />
This division, the 352d Volks Gren-<br />
adier, also had met obstacles at the Our<br />
River. Bridge work at Gentingen went<br />
badly on the first day. Men and matériel<br />
were lost when American howitzers and<br />
mortars found the range. Handling<br />
bridge sections in the swift current and<br />
on the muddy river bottom w<strong>as</strong> difficult<br />
enough without this steady fire. The<br />
approach roads on both sides of the river<br />
were steep, curved, and mud slick. The<br />
352d had been promised a <strong>To</strong>dt Bri-<br />
gade for work on the roads and at the<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
bridge, but the labor brigade never ap-<br />
peared. A wooden support bridge w<strong>as</strong><br />
finished at Gentingen late on 17 De-<br />
cember, but the transfer of artillery and<br />
motor vehicles would be very slow and<br />
only a portion of the division’s heavy<br />
weapons were west of the river by the<br />
next morning.<br />
Troops of the 914th Regiment had<br />
arrived in the bridgehead late in the<br />
day with orders to form a link between<br />
the 915th and 916th, now widely sep-<br />
arated, and to mop up the pockets of<br />
American resistance w<strong>here</strong>ver found.<br />
But t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no contact between the<br />
three German regiments when daylight<br />
ended. The chief problem, however, w<strong>as</strong><br />
not so much that of establishing a homo-<br />
geneous front <strong>as</strong> of jarring the Americans<br />
loose from the heights at the Sauer-Our<br />
triangle. The defenders at this point<br />
not only had stopped the left regiment<br />
of the 352d Volks Grenadier Division<br />
but also had helped check the right reg-<br />
iment of the neighboring 276th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division by laying fire across<br />
the Sauer valley.<br />
Resupply and evacuation were the<br />
chief concern of the 109th Infantry on<br />
the night of 17–18 December, particu-<br />
larly the problem of getting ammuni-<br />
tion to the tanks and Companies E and<br />
F. Carrying parties were used and tanks<br />
employed to bring up supplies and evac-<br />
uate the wounded. The 2d Platoon of<br />
the 707th’s Company C, supporting<br />
Companies F and G of the 109th, w<strong>as</strong><br />
refueled and resupplied during the<br />
night. But the 1st and 3d Platoons could<br />
not be reached because of enemy patrol<br />
activity.<br />
When day broke on 18 December the<br />
109th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> no longer in contact<br />
with its northern foe, the 5th Parachute
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 223<br />
Division, because this division, under<br />
peremptory orders from its commander,<br />
had continued the westward advance<br />
through the night, the forward troops<br />
defiling into the Kautenbach bridgehead.<br />
The 352d Volks Grenadier Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> still on hand; it w<strong>as</strong> approaching<br />
full strength west of the Our and for<br />
the first time could employ a number<br />
of its heavier supporting weapons in<br />
the attack. At dawn the 916th Regiment<br />
launched the strongest <strong>as</strong>sault yet leveled<br />
at the 3d Battalion position on the<br />
109th right flank, striking hard under<br />
cover of smoke to break through at the<br />
left of the battalion northwest of Hosdorf.<br />
Early in the <strong>as</strong>sault a platoon from<br />
Company K w<strong>as</strong> captured when its ammunition<br />
gave out. Company E, which<br />
had served to deflect some pressure from<br />
the 3d Battalion by its stubborn defense<br />
at Führen, w<strong>as</strong> no longer in the fight.<br />
No word had come from Führen since<br />
2300 the previous evening. Company B,<br />
sent up the Tandel road to reach Führen,<br />
had paused at about the same hour<br />
only a short distance from the village. 4<br />
The next morning a patrol with a tank<br />
and a jeep reached the edge of Fuhren,<br />
but found the company command post<br />
burned and no sign of American troops.<br />
The loss of Company E and the platoon<br />
from Company K made the 3d Battalion<br />
position precarious. Meanwhile<br />
the twenty-five men left in Company A<br />
had withdrawn from the Longsdorf road<br />
under cover of indirect fire laid down<br />
by two tanks which formed a rear guard.<br />
The tankers were shown how to give<br />
4 The 109th Infantry AAR says of this incident:<br />
“It is believed that if Company B had been more<br />
aggressive in their attack to Fouhren [Fuhren],<br />
they could have relieved the pressure on Company<br />
E, permitting them to conduct a withdrawal.”<br />
indirect fire by a forward observer from<br />
the 107th Field Artillery Battalion. The<br />
remnants of Company A joined the reg-<br />
imental antitank company at road junc-<br />
tion 206, the avenue by which enemy<br />
vehicles had to move to cut the supply<br />
road to the 3d Battalion, with orders<br />
to “hold that road.” But in the north<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no longer any question that<br />
Companies F and G could hold on, iso-<br />
lated <strong>as</strong> they were, along the road be-<br />
yond B<strong>as</strong>tendorf. About 0900 the divi-<br />
sion chief of staff gave Colonel Rudder<br />
permission to withdraw the two com-<br />
panies for use <strong>as</strong> a reserve. Under cover<br />
of the attached tank platoon roadblock<br />
at B<strong>as</strong>tendorf the companies fell back<br />
to Diekirch.<br />
During the afternoon the situation of<br />
the 109th Infantry rapidly deteriorated.<br />
At 1300 two Mark VI tanks appeared<br />
on the Longsdorf road and with infantry<br />
<strong>as</strong>sistance attacked the vital road junc-<br />
tion 206. In the fight that followed the<br />
antitank company lost all six of its re-<br />
maining 57-mm. guns, one of the three<br />
tanks left with Company A w<strong>as</strong> knocked<br />
out by a direct hit, and a breakthrough<br />
threatened momentarily. At 1410, while<br />
the fight w<strong>as</strong> in progress Colonel Rudder<br />
<strong>as</strong>ked for and received permission to pull<br />
his regiment together on the high ground<br />
around Diekirch; this withdrawal, how-<br />
ever, already w<strong>as</strong> in progress. Forty tons<br />
of supplies and the hospital units were<br />
moved first. At 1300 the tank platoon<br />
at the battery positions on the Hoscheid<br />
road hooked up the artillery pieces and<br />
started south. By then the 2d Battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> moving from B<strong>as</strong>tendorf, under<br />
small arms fire “from all directions.”<br />
The 3d Battalion, l<strong>as</strong>t out, made its way<br />
west along the Bettendorf road, which<br />
already w<strong>as</strong> under fire. During the late
224 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
evening the <strong>as</strong>sembly of the regiment at<br />
Diekirch w<strong>as</strong> completed, the 3d Battal-<br />
ion and engineers blowing the bridges<br />
at Bettendorf over which the enemy<br />
might p<strong>as</strong>s to the south bank of the<br />
Sauer. With the river momentarily se-<br />
cure at its back the regiment dug in<br />
along an arc facing out from Diekirch.<br />
But the 109th w<strong>as</strong> no longer strong<br />
enough to man a continuous defensive<br />
line. Five hundred officers and men had<br />
been lost in the three-day battle; of the<br />
heavy infantry weapons only one section<br />
of 81-mm. mortars and four sections of<br />
heavy machine guns were left; the anti-<br />
tank company had no pieces; the tank<br />
company badly needed fuel and main-<br />
tenance. But in these three days the reg-<br />
iment had held the enemy short of<br />
the Ettelbruck crossing and prevented<br />
the planned concentration of the 352d<br />
Volks Grenadier Division south of the<br />
Sauer. That the 109th had used every<br />
weapon at its disposal is shown by the<br />
ammunition expenditure for these days:<br />
280,000 rounds of small arms ammuni-<br />
tion, 5,000 rounds of mortar, 3,000 gre-<br />
nades, and 300 bazooka rounds. That<br />
the 109th had disrupted the German<br />
plans is witnessed by the fact that the<br />
commander of the 352d w<strong>as</strong> unable to<br />
get his division in hand until 19 De-<br />
cember, while the attack in force could<br />
not be resumed until 20 December.<br />
ETTELBRUCK
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 225<br />
The 109th Infantry, however, had<br />
been forced back fanwise away from the<br />
rest of the 28th Division. Its closest<br />
friendly forces were those of CCA, 9th<br />
Armored Division, now south and e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the 109th across the Sauer. Colonel<br />
Rudder, still under orders to fight for<br />
time and space, w<strong>as</strong> enjoined by General<br />
Cota on the morning of 19 December<br />
“not to recoil any further than the Sure<br />
[Sauer] River.” The 109th, fortunately,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> given a few hours to rest and better<br />
its defenses before the enemy continued<br />
the advance to wipe out the Diekirch-<br />
Ettelbruck bridgehead.<br />
Early in the afternoon German guns<br />
opened up on the Diekirch positions<br />
(the artillery regiment of the 352d had<br />
just come into position west of the Our),<br />
and those elements of the 915th and<br />
916th Regiments which the 352d com-<br />
mander could personally gather were<br />
thrown into a series of piecemeal <strong>as</strong>-<br />
saults. For two hours the fight went back<br />
and forth, 5 involving the 2d Battalion<br />
on the Diekirch-Hoscheid road and<br />
the 3d Battalion aligned on the ridge<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Diekirch. Schmidt, the German<br />
division commander, tried to lead<br />
his troops forward and w<strong>as</strong> seriously<br />
wounded. When night came the fight<br />
flared up once more, small groups of<br />
the enemy probing for weak points while<br />
artillery fire and searchlights were em-<br />
ployed to guide the attack and distract<br />
the defenders. Colonel Rudder phoned<br />
the 28th Division chief of staff about<br />
2000, told him that the 109th might be<br />
5 When the antitank company w<strong>as</strong> forced to pull<br />
back to a new position, Capt. Paul F. Gaynor re-<br />
mained alone to cover the withdrawal. He killed<br />
eight Germans with his carbine, wounded several<br />
ochers, then made a d<strong>as</strong>h under fire across open<br />
ground and rejoined his company. He w<strong>as</strong> awarded<br />
the DSC.<br />
cut off and surrounded, and suggested<br />
that he should pull his regiment back<br />
to the southwest across the Sauer to cover<br />
the left flank of the 9th Armored Divi-<br />
sion. General Cota agreed that a further<br />
withdrawal could be made but in-<br />
structed Rudder to stay in his own zone<br />
of action, that is, to make a withdrawal<br />
to the west.<br />
Fifteen minutes later the 28th Divi-<br />
sion commander got in touch with<br />
General Middleton, the VIII Corps com-<br />
mander, and presented the alternatives<br />
now facing the 109th Infantry. The<br />
109th “could fight it out . . . and that<br />
would be the end”; the regiment could<br />
tie in closely with the 9th Armored force<br />
and withdraw to the south; or the 109th<br />
and the 9th Armored force could be<br />
pulled back toward B<strong>as</strong>togne. General<br />
Middleton had just finished speaking<br />
to Maj. Gen. John W. Leonard, the 9th<br />
Armored commander, and had promised<br />
a battalion from the incoming 80th In-<br />
fantry Division to fill the gap between<br />
Leonard and Rudder. (General Brad-<br />
ley or Maj. Gen. William H. H. Morris,<br />
Jr., the provisional corps commander,<br />
later canceled this move so <strong>as</strong> to keep<br />
the 80th together.) Middleton t<strong>here</strong>fore<br />
told Cota that the 109th w<strong>as</strong> to hold,<br />
but if forced back it should retire to the<br />
west behind the Alzette, a stream line<br />
directly south of Ettelbruck. These<br />
orders were p<strong>as</strong>sed on to the 109th. How-<br />
ever the final instructions to Rudder rec-<br />
ognized the need for reliance on the<br />
commander on the ground; he w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
“act according to the situation.” In point<br />
of fact the 109th already w<strong>as</strong> on the<br />
march west through Ettelbruck.<br />
General Leonard still expected that the<br />
109th would fall back to the south and<br />
join the 9th Armored (the 109th w<strong>as</strong>
226<br />
not yet under his command), but Rud-<br />
der w<strong>as</strong> in contact with the enemy and<br />
could not risk the disorganization at-<br />
tendant on a change in plans at this<br />
point.<br />
The withdrawal itself w<strong>as</strong> a success,<br />
despite the intense interdiction fire laid<br />
down by the Germans, fire that cost<br />
thirty-four c<strong>as</strong>ualties from shelling alone.<br />
The 107th and 108th Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talions, emplaced near Bissen, answered<br />
the enemy guns and gave what protec-<br />
tion they could to the marching infantry.<br />
Engineer parties laid mines on the main<br />
roads and blew the l<strong>as</strong>t bridges at Die-<br />
kirch. The rear guard, formed from<br />
the attached tank company, stayed on in<br />
Diekirch, w<strong>here</strong> the first platoon cap-<br />
tured 107 prisoners. By midnight the 1st<br />
and 3d Battalions were west of the Al-<br />
zette, strung along the west-reaching<br />
line of hills which began just south of<br />
Ettelbruck and anchored near Grosbous.<br />
Here the 109th faced north, forming the<br />
westernmost segment of the still firm<br />
south shoulder of the VIII Corps line.<br />
General Leonard ordered the 2d Bat-<br />
talion, reduced to half strength, over to<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t side of the Alzette to offer some<br />
infantry protection for the 9th Armored<br />
tanks in the Stegen-Ermsdorf area. In<br />
Ettelbruck demolition parties remained<br />
at work until the morning of 20 Decem-<br />
ber; then they withdrew, blowing the<br />
bridges behind them.<br />
The troop withdrawal from Diekirch<br />
w<strong>as</strong> followed by a m<strong>as</strong>s exodus of the<br />
civilian population. When the Germans<br />
first shelled the town on 16 December,<br />
the citizenry had started to leave Die-<br />
kirch but had been halted by American<br />
officers and local officials so <strong>as</strong> to keep<br />
the supply roads open to the 109th.<br />
Rumors of the American withdrawal on<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the 19th brought the people of Die-<br />
kirch out of their cellars and into the<br />
streets. They were particularly apprehen-<br />
sive because members of the local gen-<br />
darmerie had fought alongside the<br />
Americans and taken a score of German<br />
prisoners who now were housed in the<br />
local jail. Finally it w<strong>as</strong> agreed that the<br />
civil population would evacuate the town<br />
at midnight on the 19th following the<br />
main troop movement. So, in freezing<br />
cold, some three thousand men, women,<br />
and children set out on the road to<br />
Mersch, leaving behind four hundred<br />
of the townspeople who refused to aban-<br />
don aged relatives or property. 6<br />
All during the day of the 20th the<br />
109th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> out of touch with the<br />
enemy. The 352d Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion had <strong>as</strong>sembled two of its regiments<br />
west of B<strong>as</strong>tendorf during the previous<br />
night, leaving the 916th Regiment to<br />
occupy Diekirch <strong>as</strong> the Americans left.<br />
Strict orders had arrived from the Sev-<br />
enth <strong>Army</strong> headquarters, located at In-<br />
gendorf (a little village southwest of<br />
Bitburg), that the 352d must start the<br />
attack rolling once more and take posses-<br />
sion of the vital crossings at Ettelbruck.<br />
<strong>To</strong> make success certain, General<br />
Brandenberger, the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> com-<br />
mander, sent army artillery and rocket<br />
projectors to join the 352d artillery bat-<br />
talions in creating an “artillery center<br />
of gravity” at B<strong>as</strong>tendorf. The short-<br />
age of bridging equipment continued to<br />
plague the Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, but Branden-<br />
berger’s staff scraped together an im-<br />
promptu bridge train and started it to-<br />
6 This story is given in Rapport sur L’activité<br />
de la Gendarmerie Grand-Ducale lors du bom-<br />
bardment et de L’evacuation de la ville de Die-<br />
kirch, provided the author by the Luxembourg<br />
liaison officer at Headquarters, SHAPE.
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 227<br />
ward Ettelbruck. Fortunately for the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> drivers, gunners, and pon-<br />
toneers, the skies remained overc<strong>as</strong>t and<br />
the columns moved freely along the<br />
roads. At Diekirch the 916th Regiment<br />
found that one bridge had escaped com-<br />
plete destruction and could bear infantry<br />
and single heavy weapons; so the regi-<br />
ment moved across the Sauer, its inten-<br />
tion to take Ettelbruck from the rear.<br />
The German center, and the bridge<br />
train, converged on Ettelbruck. Mean-<br />
while part of the 352d Volks Granadier<br />
Division crossed the north-south branch<br />
of the Sauer and marched west to the<br />
Wark Creek, apparently intending to<br />
CAVE REFUGE FOR CIVILIANS<br />
envelop the open American flank from<br />
the left.<br />
Elements of the 9th Armored<br />
Division Battle at the Sauer<br />
16–20 December<br />
Only six days prior to the German<br />
attack, troops of the 9th Armored Divi-<br />
sion (General Leonard) had been <strong>as</strong>-<br />
signed a 3-mile sector on the VIII Corps<br />
front between the 28th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion and the 4th Infantry Division. This<br />
sector fronted on the Sauer River south<br />
of the junction with the Our and earlier<br />
had been held by a battalion of the 109th
228 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Infantry. The bulk of the 9th Armored<br />
Division, a unit with no prior battle<br />
experience, w<strong>as</strong> held in the west <strong>as</strong> the<br />
VIII Corps reserve, but just before the<br />
German attack CCB w<strong>as</strong> transferred to<br />
V Corps. The new sector w<strong>as</strong> manned<br />
by the 60th Armored Infantry Battalion<br />
(Lt. Col. Kenneth W. Collins), sup-<br />
ported by the 3d Armored Field Artil-<br />
lery Battalión at Haller. As w<strong>as</strong> custom-<br />
ary the armored infantry had been<br />
placed in line in this quiet sector for<br />
combat indoctrination, and in the first<br />
few days the Germans on the opposite<br />
bank of the Sauer showed so little in-<br />
clination to disturb the prevailing quiet<br />
that Collins w<strong>as</strong> concerned lest his bat-<br />
talion secure no combat experience what-<br />
ever. He need not have worried.<br />
Across the river a fresh German Divi-<br />
sion, the 276th Volks Grenadier (Gen-<br />
eralleutnant Kurt Moehring) , had just<br />
come in from Poland and w<strong>as</strong> dispersed<br />
in the little Eifel villages between Ech-<br />
ternach and Bitburg. Units of the 276th<br />
were moved frequently in the week be-<br />
fore the attack, companies exchanging<br />
billets to mislead both the local pop-<br />
ulace and the American intelligence.<br />
Finally, in two night marches the divi-<br />
sion concentrated on the e<strong>as</strong>t bank of<br />
the Sauer, its zone of attack defined in<br />
the north by Wallendorf (at the junction<br />
of the Our and the Sauer) and in the<br />
WALLENDORF, VIEWED FROM REISDORF on the western side of the Sauer River.
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 229<br />
south by Bollendorf. The 276th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, then, generally<br />
faced the 60th Armored Infantry Bat-<br />
talion, but it should be noticed that the<br />
tortuous gorge of the Schwarz Erntz lay<br />
in the zone of the 276th and would be<br />
used to gain entry to the left flank and<br />
rear of the 4th Infantry Division.<br />
Moehring’s division had been recon-<br />
stituted during the autumn following<br />
almost complete destruction in Nor-<br />
mandy and the retreat across France.<br />
Rebuilt around wounded veterans who<br />
had returned from the hospitals, the<br />
division w<strong>as</strong> fairly young in terms of the<br />
conscription cl<strong>as</strong>ses it represented and<br />
w<strong>as</strong> at full strength when it moved west<br />
from Poland. The 276th, however,<br />
could not count on accompanying gun<br />
support for its infantry since no <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns had been supplied. In addition the<br />
divisional artillery and train were horse-<br />
drawn. In the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> plan this<br />
division formed the right wing of the<br />
LXXX Corps. The 276th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division, which with the 212th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division constituted<br />
this corps, had no distant objective such<br />
<strong>as</strong> those <strong>as</strong>signed the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
formations on its right. The only definite<br />
mission given the 276th w<strong>as</strong> to gain the<br />
high ground across the Sauer, dislocate<br />
the American artillery positions around<br />
Haller, and form the western extension<br />
of the blocking line which the LXXX<br />
Corps w<strong>as</strong> to present to any American<br />
thrust aimed at the southern pivot of<br />
the great counteroffensive. Once the<br />
western Sauer heights between Wallen-<br />
dorf and Bollendorf were in hand, the<br />
advance of the 276th would turn toward<br />
the southwest, moving alongside the<br />
212th. In c<strong>as</strong>e the opportunity offered,<br />
advance contingents might push <strong>as</strong> far<br />
<strong>as</strong> Mersch and the area north of Luxem-<br />
bourg. This l<strong>as</strong>t maneuver, however,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not a mandatory part of the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> plan.<br />
On the morning of the attack the<br />
LXXX Corps artillery broke the long<br />
quiet on the Sauer River <strong>as</strong> six bat-<br />
talions and a rocket projector brigade<br />
divided their fire to reinforce the divi-<br />
sional artillery of the 276th and 212th.<br />
The initial concentration in the 9th<br />
Armored Division (-) sector, estimated<br />
by the Americans at about a thousand<br />
rounds, w<strong>as</strong> aimed principally at Beau-<br />
fort, the largest town in this area, and<br />
the batteries around Haller. Damage<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not extensive but the forward tele-<br />
phone lines were shot out. The thick<br />
fog and early morning darkness must<br />
have been <strong>as</strong> much a problem to the<br />
German <strong>as</strong>sault units <strong>as</strong> to the American<br />
observers looking out toward the river.<br />
In any c<strong>as</strong>e t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> considerable con-<br />
fusion and delay on the e<strong>as</strong>t bank, and<br />
few or none of the rubber <strong>as</strong>sault boats<br />
landed on the American side before 0630.<br />
Once across, the German <strong>as</strong>sault troops<br />
moved rapidly up the draws, m<strong>as</strong>ked<br />
from view by the fog and the heavy<br />
woods.<br />
The main crossing w<strong>as</strong> made by the<br />
986th Regiment near Wallendorf. Part<br />
of one battalion circled into the sharp<br />
valley w<strong>here</strong> the Our and Sauer meet,<br />
intending to seize Hill 402 (southwest<br />
of Bigelbach) , which offered the best<br />
observation in the vicinity. These troops<br />
succeeded in wiping out a squad of<br />
armored infantry that had been sta-<br />
tioned to watch the valley, but soon<br />
mortar and machine gun fire from the<br />
3d Battalion, 109th Infantry, watching<br />
from the heights north of the Our,<br />
stopped the Germans in their tracks.
230 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
The second battalion of the 986th moved<br />
cautiously up the draws and ravines to-<br />
ward Bigelbach. This village lay on a<br />
slope and had not been occupied, al-<br />
though American patrols moved in now<br />
and then at night to check suspicious<br />
lights. As a result the 986th w<strong>as</strong> able to<br />
report that it had made gains on its left<br />
and “taken” Bigelbach. For some re<strong>as</strong>on<br />
the Germans did not push on and Com-<br />
pany C, holding the hills and crests<br />
south of Bigelbach, engaged them in a<br />
desultory, long-range fire fight for the<br />
rest of the day.<br />
The center German regiment, 988th,<br />
made its crossings near Dillingen, aim-<br />
ing in the direction of Beaufort and<br />
Haller. Here Company A w<strong>as</strong> deployed<br />
in the woods above the Sauer with ob-<br />
servation on the river but with insuffi-<br />
cient strength to block the numerous<br />
ravines running up the wooded heights.<br />
By noon the attack threatened to over-<br />
run the company and infiltration had<br />
taken place at several points, the German<br />
movements hidden by the dense pine.<br />
Colonel Collins committed Company B,<br />
in reserve at Beaufort, to attack through<br />
Company A in an effort to restore the<br />
position and drive the Germans back<br />
over the Sauer. The reserve company<br />
ran up against units of the 988th which<br />
had penetrated between the two forward<br />
companies but moved f<strong>as</strong>t and reached<br />
a position abre<strong>as</strong>t of A and C. All this<br />
while the batteries around Haller had<br />
been shelling the enemy crossing points;<br />
the cost to the Germans must have<br />
been high, but they kept coming.<br />
In midafternoon General Leonard<br />
dipped into his reserves to support the<br />
60th Armored Infantry Battalion. Since<br />
the 9th Armored Division w<strong>as</strong> in this<br />
sector with a force equivalent only to a<br />
combat command, Leonard’s reserves<br />
consisted of one tank battalion (the<br />
19th) , a company from the divisional<br />
engineers, a battery from the 482d Air-<br />
craft Artillery Battalion, most of the<br />
89th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron,<br />
a company of self-propelled tank de-<br />
stroyers, and two reconnaissance pla-<br />
toons belonging to the 811th Tank De-<br />
stroyer Battalion. These units would<br />
fight <strong>as</strong> a combat command, although<br />
the sector w<strong>as</strong> not turned over to Col.<br />
‘Thom<strong>as</strong> L. Harrold and CCA head-<br />
quarters until the next morning. One<br />
troop w<strong>as</strong> taken from the cavalry and<br />
given to the 60th Armored Infantry Bat-<br />
talion; the armored cars moved forward<br />
and spent the night of 16–17 December<br />
outposting Beaufort and patrolling the<br />
road which ran from the town into the<br />
Schwarz Erntz gorge.<br />
This deep, thickly wooded gorge<br />
posed a constant threat to both CCA<br />
and the 4th Infantry Division. As yet<br />
the enemy made no attempt to utilize<br />
the natural sally port, but in the 4th<br />
Division sector German infantry sur-<br />
rounded Berdorf, which controlled a<br />
lateral road descending into the gorge.<br />
In the 9th Armored sector three lateral<br />
draws debouched west from the gorge<br />
toward Haller, Waldbillig, and Christ-<br />
nach. In the late afternoon Company A,<br />
19th Tank Battalion, joined the 12th<br />
Infantry (4th Division) <strong>as</strong> a mobile<br />
reserve in this area. Troop B, 89th<br />
Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron, came<br />
up to reinforce Company B, 811th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion, whose 76-mm. self-<br />
propelled guns covered the Waldbillig<br />
and Christnach draws. The right flank<br />
of the 9th Armored, although none too<br />
secure, at le<strong>as</strong>t w<strong>as</strong> outposted. During<br />
the late afternoon the enemy, who ear-
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 231<br />
lier had been stopped on the left flank,<br />
worked closer in toward Reisdorf using<br />
the cover of the woods. This threat <strong>as</strong><br />
yet w<strong>as</strong> not too serious, but the light<br />
tank company of the 19th Tank Bat-<br />
talion w<strong>as</strong> dispatched north of Ermsdorf<br />
to watch the road which angled from<br />
Reisdorf behind the left flank of the<br />
position occupied by the 60th Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion.<br />
The 276th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
had failed to seize control of the Sauer<br />
heights. Although <strong>as</strong>sault parties had<br />
made successful penetrations in unde-<br />
fended sectors, some <strong>as</strong> deep <strong>as</strong> one and<br />
a half miles, stubbornly defended strong-<br />
points had checked any co-ordinated ad-<br />
vance. The deeply incised terrain had<br />
given tactical advantage, but this had<br />
been canceled by communications fail-<br />
ures brought on by the poor perform-<br />
ance of the German radio sets on the<br />
deep-pocketed ground. Futhermore, the<br />
276th lacked the artillery so necessary<br />
for close infantry support in this type<br />
of terrain and had been forced to parcel<br />
its two howitzer battalions in small sec-<br />
tions along the e<strong>as</strong>t bank. On the whole<br />
the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> command w<strong>as</strong> far from<br />
ple<strong>as</strong>ed by the day’s performance, press-<br />
ing General Moehring to continue the<br />
attack through the night.<br />
Infiltration tactics began to bear fruit<br />
<strong>as</strong> day came on 17 December. In the<br />
center of the 9th Armored sector the<br />
60th Armored Infantry Battalion head-<br />
quarters at Beaufort discovered that the<br />
enemy had cut in between the head-<br />
quarters and the three companies of<br />
armored infantry in the line. 7 Six ar-<br />
7 Companies A and C had no communications<br />
with the battalion. During the night of the 16th<br />
the two company commanders, Capt. John W.<br />
Schalles and Capt. Roger L. Shinn, each got a<br />
mored cars counterattacked and cleared<br />
the high ground north of Beaufort but<br />
were unable to drive the Germans from<br />
the woods behind the isolated compa-<br />
nies. The enemy meanwhile bore in on<br />
both flanks. On the south the 987th Reg-<br />
iment, thus far missing in American<br />
identifications of the 276th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division, appeared during the<br />
morning. One of its battalions marched<br />
unopposed through the Schwarz Erntz<br />
gorge and occupied Mullerthal, the<br />
point at which narrow, wooded defiles<br />
led out to Waldbillig and Christnach in<br />
the 9th Armored (-) zone, and to Cons-<br />
dorf in the 4th Division rear.<br />
About 1330 Troop B, 89th Cavalry<br />
Reconnaissance Squadron, and four tank<br />
destroyers from the 811th Tank De-<br />
stroyer Battalion, launched a counter-<br />
attack from Waldbillig to regain Muller-<br />
thal. The leading tank destroyer w<strong>as</strong> set<br />
afire by a German Panzerfaust, effec-<br />
tively blocking the narrow road. The<br />
dismounted cavalry encountered accu-<br />
rate small arms fire <strong>as</strong> they attempted<br />
to work ahead and the acting command-<br />
er of Troop B w<strong>as</strong> killed. The unseen<br />
enemy, firing behind the cover of huge<br />
boulders and trees, had the upper hand:<br />
at dark a platoon of cavalry <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
laid down a protective barrage and the<br />
American t<strong>as</strong>k force withdrew to the<br />
hills flanking the exit from the Wald-<br />
billig-Müllerthal defile.<br />
German efforts to achieve a real pene-<br />
tration on the left flank were less success-<br />
ful than on the right. Advance troops<br />
of the 2d Battalion, 986th Regiment,<br />
worked their way through the crossfire<br />
coming from the 109th Infantry and the<br />
half-track loaded with rations and ammunition<br />
and ran it through to the rifle line.
232 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
60th Armored Infantry Battalion and<br />
briefly occupied Eppeldorf, only to be<br />
run out by the light tanks b<strong>as</strong>ed on<br />
Ermsdorf.<br />
The chief German success on 17 De-<br />
cember came at the close of day, with<br />
an attack by the 1st Battalion, 988th<br />
Regiment, on Beaufort. Here, during<br />
daylight hours, the attackers had literal-<br />
ly been “blown all over” (<strong>as</strong> American<br />
observers reported) by the howitzers fir-<br />
ing from Savelborn and the guns on<br />
three headquarters tanks. But at dark<br />
Germans seeped into the town from <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembly points in the woods, only some<br />
fifteen hundred yards distant, and am-<br />
bushed an 81-mm. mortar platoon when<br />
this shifted to meet the <strong>as</strong>sault. Colonel<br />
Collins ordered the headquarters of the<br />
60th Armored Infantry Battalion back<br />
to the motor park near Savelborn and<br />
committed Troop A, 89th Cavalry Re-<br />
connaissance Squadron, to fight a rear<br />
guard action in Beaufort. The cavalry<br />
unit, led by Capt. Victor C. Leiker, held<br />
on until 2030, by which time the Ger-<br />
man infantry controlled all the street<br />
corners, then fought its way south to<br />
Waldbillig. This rear guard stand cost<br />
Troop A 16 jeeps and 7 of its 12 armored<br />
cars <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> 43 c<strong>as</strong>ualties.<br />
While the 60th Armored Infantry Bat-<br />
talion headquarters withdrew to Savel-<br />
born, the 3d Armored Field Artillery<br />
Battalion moved its batteries west from<br />
Haller to the Savelborn-Medernach<br />
road. Despite continuous counterbattery<br />
fire, the gunners had given steady and<br />
effective support whenever called upon,<br />
expending about 4,000 rounds during<br />
the two-day action. When the batteries<br />
displaced, forty artillerymen, with four<br />
half-tracks, and Battery A of the 482d<br />
Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion re-<br />
mained behind to block any German<br />
penetration through the cross-corridor of<br />
the Schwarz Erntz which led p<strong>as</strong>t Haller<br />
back into the Savelborn position. By<br />
midnight, then, the 9th Armored line<br />
w<strong>as</strong> re-forming, from Waldbillig (still<br />
held by cavalry and tank destroyers) to<br />
Ermsdorf, w<strong>here</strong> the light tanks con-<br />
tinued to patrol. Contact with the three<br />
line companies w<strong>as</strong> lost, but they fought<br />
on in their original positions, under<br />
orders from the battalion commander to<br />
hold their ground. With company fronts<br />
a mile wide, the fight became a series of<br />
squad actions <strong>as</strong> the enemy infantry<br />
filtered through and behind the Ameri-<br />
can “line.” Each attempt to re-lay a<br />
telephone wire or carry forward an am-<br />
munition c<strong>as</strong>e became a major tactical<br />
effort.<br />
Although the 276th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division had driven a number of wedges<br />
into the 9th Armored sector during 17<br />
December, the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> command-<br />
er w<strong>as</strong> very dissatisfied with the divi-<br />
sion performance. The 276th w<strong>as</strong> still<br />
hung up on the Sauer River. A part<br />
of its infantry and nearly all supporting<br />
heavy weapons remained on the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
bank waiting for a bridge to be com-<br />
pleted at Wallendorf, w<strong>here</strong> American<br />
shells had sm<strong>as</strong>hed much equipment and<br />
killed many engineers. Brandenberger<br />
sent word to OB WEST that a new<br />
commander w<strong>as</strong> needed for the 276th<br />
Division. But General Moehring did not<br />
live to greet his successor: en route in<br />
his staff car from Beaufort to Muller-<br />
thal he w<strong>as</strong> killed by machine gun fire.<br />
The fighting armored infantry had so<br />
successfully contained the German main<br />
forces on 16 and 17 December that the<br />
infiltrating units which first made head-<br />
way in the Beaufort area were relatively
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 233<br />
small. The 9th Armored intelligence<br />
estimates set the enemy strength to be<br />
encountered <strong>here</strong> at approximately three<br />
companies. Against this supposedly lim-<br />
ited force the CCA commander mustered<br />
his remaining men, <strong>as</strong>sault guns, and<br />
armored vehicles for a counterattack to<br />
re-establish contact with the three iso-<br />
lated companies “and drive the enemy<br />
into the river.” Colonel Harrold’s avail-<br />
able force now included only Company<br />
B, 19th Tank Battalion; a platoon of<br />
Company D’s light tanks; a cavalry <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault gun platoon; the I and R platoon<br />
from the 60th; and Company A, 9th Ar-<br />
mored Engineer Battalion (a part of<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> loaded in half-tracks) .<br />
The counterattack w<strong>as</strong> to be made by<br />
two t<strong>as</strong>k forces. T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hall (Capt.<br />
John W. Hall) would lead from the<br />
Savelborn <strong>as</strong>sembly area north to Berens<br />
and then drive north to Company C<br />
while the second t<strong>as</strong>k force, T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Philbeck (Maj. <strong>To</strong>mmie M. Philbeck),<br />
attacked to the e<strong>as</strong>t and northe<strong>as</strong>t to<br />
reach the other two companies. Before<br />
dawn on 18 December the I and R pla-<br />
toon started in its jeeps along the narrow<br />
road to Berens, reconnoitering in ad-<br />
vance of the main column. Fire sud-<br />
BELGIAN WOMAN SALVAGING GRAIN IN GUTTED BARN
234 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
denly poured in from all sides, killing the<br />
platoon commander and cutting the unit<br />
to pieces in a matter of minutes. T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Hall, continuing the advance in<br />
daylight, reached the thick Eselbour<br />
woods, but t<strong>here</strong> took the wrong turning<br />
at a crossroad. The light tanks, forming<br />
the advance guard, had moved only a few<br />
hundred yards when the Germans<br />
opened fire with bazook<strong>as</strong>, knocking out<br />
the lead tank and blocking the road.<br />
Captain Hall, the leader of this t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force, w<strong>as</strong> wounded but manned an <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault gun and cleared the enemy from<br />
the road. He w<strong>as</strong> awarded the Distin-<br />
guished Service Cross. Shortly after noon<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Philbeck p<strong>as</strong>sed through<br />
Hall’s position, only to lose more tanks.<br />
The Americans lost seven tanks before<br />
the order finally came to withdraw.<br />
The American setback had stemmed<br />
from the l<strong>as</strong>t act of General Moehring<br />
<strong>as</strong> commander of the 276th. Moehring<br />
had collected a battalion of the 986th<br />
Regiment and an antitank company<br />
armed with fifty-four Panzerfausts for an<br />
attack across the Savelborn-Ermsdorf<br />
road to seize Medernach. During the<br />
night of 17–18 December this force <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembled in the cover of the Eselbour<br />
woods, waiting to jump off at dawn.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> it lay, with perfect cover for close-<br />
in work with the bazooka, when the<br />
American advance began. Lacking suffi-<br />
cient infantry to clear the woods or de-<br />
fend the tanks, the Americans had been<br />
unable to profit by their superority in<br />
heavy weapons.<br />
The situation on the flanks in the CCA<br />
sector also w<strong>as</strong> unfavorable to the Ameri-<br />
cans. At Ermsdorf, which had been the<br />
linchpin on the northern flank, elements<br />
of the 1st Battalion, 986th Regiment,<br />
brought up mortars and attacked. The<br />
light tanks beat off the Germans but<br />
were forced to give up their screening<br />
activities in this area. On the right flank<br />
Troop C of the cavalry made a dismount-<br />
ed <strong>as</strong>sault from Haller with the intention<br />
of retaking Beaufort. The troopers were<br />
supported by six half-tracks from Com-<br />
pany A, 482d Antiaircraft Artillery Bat-<br />
talion, mounting the deadly quadruple<br />
.50-caliber machine guns, but the half-<br />
tracks found it impossible to maneuver<br />
in the heavy woods. The Germans ahead<br />
laid down mortar fire; the cavalry were<br />
hard hit and could not maneuver, the<br />
half-tracks could not close with the Ger-<br />
man mortar crews, and the attack w<strong>as</strong><br />
abandoned. 8<br />
In fact the American force w<strong>as</strong> too<br />
slight to hold the original position on<br />
the high ground north of Haller, and<br />
it withdrew to the new defensive po-<br />
sition being formed by CCA <strong>as</strong> an after-<br />
math to the reverses suffered during the<br />
day. In the course of this withdrawal<br />
the armored field artillery batteries were<br />
hard beset and had to beat off the enemy<br />
at four hundred yards range. Two bat-<br />
teries actually took new firing positions<br />
in front of the rifle line. After dark CCA<br />
reorganized on a line running roughly<br />
northwest from Waldbillig to Ermsdorf,<br />
thence west to the high ground around<br />
Stegen, the latter about two and a half<br />
miles south of Diekirch w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
109th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> in the process of<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembly. The Germans finally had<br />
opened the western Sauer valley and<br />
driven an entering wedge between the<br />
9th Armored Division and the 109th In-<br />
fantry. The gap between Stegen and<br />
Diekirch could be closed to the enemy<br />
8 Pfc. T. J. Zimmerer, an aid man, stayed be-<br />
hind enemy lines for eleven days with a severely<br />
wounded soldier. He w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 235<br />
only by roadblocks and roving patrols,<br />
but the Germans failed to follow up<br />
their advantage on the night of 18–19<br />
December.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no longer thought of re-<br />
lieving the three armored infantry com-<br />
panies still behind the enemy lines. Colo-<br />
nel Collins sent word to withdraw, via<br />
a radio which a forward observer from<br />
the 3d Field Artillery Battalion had re-<br />
paired and by officers from the isolated<br />
companies who previously had made<br />
daring d<strong>as</strong>hes by jeep through the Ger-<br />
mans to bring out wounded and carry<br />
forward ammunition. During the next<br />
three days volunteers led back nearly<br />
60 percent of the armored infantry,<br />
but the three-day fight had cost the 60th<br />
an estimated 231 c<strong>as</strong>ualties. 9<br />
Across the lines the psychological lift<br />
which might have been given by the<br />
appearance of the new commander, Col.<br />
Hugo Dempwolff, and the successful at-<br />
tack against the 109th Infantry by the<br />
352d Volks Grenadier Division, which<br />
had finally shaken the 276th north flank<br />
loose, w<strong>as</strong> offset by General Moehring’s<br />
death and the failure to provide a bridge<br />
in the division bridgehead. So short w<strong>as</strong><br />
bridging equipment in the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> that the initial losses at Wallen-<br />
dorf could not be immediately replaced.<br />
9 The 9th Armored Division never fought <strong>as</strong> a<br />
complete division during the period covered by<br />
the present volume. As a result the 9th Armored<br />
after action report and files are of little value in<br />
tracing the action of one of its combat commands.<br />
For the series of events described in this section<br />
the main sources are the combat interviews; the<br />
60th Armored Infantry Battalion AAR; the 9th<br />
Armored Engineer Battalion AAR, which tells the<br />
very detailed story, by companies; the CCA AAR<br />
and S–3 Jnl; the separate troop histories in the<br />
89th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron AAR; and<br />
the useful AAR of the 811th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion.<br />
On the night of 18–19 December, the<br />
divisions on the right and left of the<br />
276th permitted artillery, some rocket<br />
projectors, and supplies to move across<br />
their bridges to the 276th. As yet the<br />
company of <strong>as</strong>sault guns which the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> had promised w<strong>as</strong> no-<br />
w<strong>here</strong> in sight.<br />
Colonel Dempwolff, taking stock of<br />
conditions in his new command, found<br />
that losses had been high (<strong>as</strong>cribed by<br />
the unit commanders to the continued<br />
absence of <strong>as</strong>sault gun support) and that<br />
spirits were low. He determined to con-<br />
tinue the attack, nevertheless, this time<br />
using the newly arrived supporting<br />
weapons to bring his left and center reg-<br />
iments together in a co-ordinated thrust<br />
against Waldbillig, the anchor position<br />
for the south flank of the 9th Armored<br />
Division. On 19 December, then, Demp-<br />
wolff reorganized his regiments, moved<br />
artillery and rocket projectors forward,<br />
and gave his troops food and rest. At<br />
Bollendorf his engineers finally com-<br />
pleted a bridge over the 40-yard-wide<br />
river, lessening somewhat the pinch on<br />
the 276th.<br />
CCA took this much needed breath-<br />
ing spell to prepare roadblocks and dem-<br />
olitions in front of its new 7-mile-long<br />
main line of resistance. At best this posi-<br />
tion amounted to a thin screen with nu-<br />
merous gaps; so a slim reserve w<strong>as</strong> creat-<br />
ed consisting of two engineer platoons<br />
and a dozen <strong>as</strong>sault guns. During the<br />
morning, contact with the Germans w<strong>as</strong><br />
lost. Patrols that went out to the front<br />
and flanks found nothing in the danger-<br />
ous gap between Ermsdorf and Diekirch<br />
but drove off a German patrol which<br />
w<strong>as</strong> moving south from Eppeldorf, not<br />
west into the gap. At the right end of<br />
the American line patrols discovered a
236 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
large group of Germans in a farmhouse.<br />
After a platoon of tank destroyers shelled<br />
the house, a volunteer squad of seven<br />
noncoms from Battery A, 48rd Antiair-<br />
craft Artillery Battalion, made the <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault with <strong>To</strong>mmy guns and hand gre-<br />
nades. A corporal killed three Germans<br />
with a bl<strong>as</strong>t from his <strong>To</strong>mmy gun, after<br />
he himself had been shot in the stomach,<br />
and fifty-nine Germans gave up the fight.<br />
The 9th Armored Division could re-<br />
port on the night of the 19th that the<br />
situation on its right flank w<strong>as</strong> satisfac-<br />
tory, and on the left flank too <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong><br />
Stegen; beyond Stegen the situation w<strong>as</strong><br />
“obscure.” General Leonard borrowed<br />
the 90th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squad-<br />
ron (less three troops) from the 4th<br />
Infantry Division zone, w<strong>here</strong> a part of<br />
its parent organization, the 10th Ar-<br />
mored Division, had initiated counterat-<br />
tacks the previous day. But the gap be-<br />
tween the 9th Armored Division and the<br />
109th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> too large to be COY-<br />
ered by a minimal cavalry screen. Worse,<br />
the gap widened during the evening <strong>as</strong><br />
the 109th withdrew from Diekirch en<br />
route to the Ettelbruck-Grosbous line.<br />
The compromise solution that moved<br />
one much depleted battalion of the<br />
109th southe<strong>as</strong>t to make contact at Ste-<br />
gen gave General Leonard’s tanks some<br />
badly needed infantry protection but<br />
could hardly deflect any determined en-<br />
emy thrust around the left flank of the<br />
9th Armored Division. In this instance,<br />
however, the military axiom that a com-<br />
mander who is worried about the enemy<br />
may reflect on the worries besetting the<br />
enemy commander, w<strong>as</strong> proven by the<br />
event. While General Leonard voiced<br />
concern to his corps commander over the<br />
gap between the 9th Armored Division<br />
(-) and the 109th Infantry, Colonel<br />
Dempwolff w<strong>as</strong> plagued by the thought<br />
of the widening gap between the 276th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division and the 352d<br />
Volks Grenadier Division. But he had a<br />
clear order from General Brandenber-<br />
ger: the 276th must contain <strong>as</strong> many<br />
American troops <strong>as</strong> possible. This mis-<br />
sion in Dempwolff’s judgment required<br />
a continuation of the attack southwest-<br />
ward toward Waldbillig and Christnach<br />
w<strong>here</strong> American reinforcements already<br />
had arrived to help the 4th Infantry<br />
Division.<br />
Late on 19 December word reached<br />
the 276th that its missing <strong>as</strong>sault gun<br />
company had detrained at Trier. The<br />
planned attack against the 9th Armored<br />
right flank w<strong>as</strong> t<strong>here</strong>fore postponed un-<br />
til the guns could reach the 988th Regi-<br />
ment, which had been <strong>as</strong>signed the main<br />
role. In midafternom on 20 December<br />
the weapons remaining to the company,<br />
apparently not more than three or four,<br />
joined the 988th at Haller and the at-<br />
tack against Waldbillig commenced.<br />
Twice the American 76-mm. tank de-<br />
stroyers and supporting batteries of the<br />
3d Field Artillery Battalion drove off<br />
the Germans. But when night fell Demp-<br />
wolff brought the 987th Regiment<br />
through Mullerthal and into the gorge<br />
running west to Waldbillig. Menaced<br />
from two sides by superior strength, the<br />
American tank destroyers and cavalry<br />
were ordered to withdraw to the ridge<br />
south of the village.<br />
The capture of Waldbillig on 20 De-<br />
cember marked the high-water mark of<br />
the 276th Volks Grenadier Division ad-<br />
vance. The division now had a bridge<br />
at Bollendorf, its weapons were west of<br />
the Sauer, the division command post<br />
had been moved across to Beaufort, and<br />
the center and left regiments had made
ATTACK BY GERMAN LEFT WING: 16–20 DECEMBER 237<br />
contact at Waldbillig. The 276th, how-<br />
ever, had paid heavily for the restricted<br />
success achieved in the five days’ attack,<br />
success more limited than that gained<br />
by any other division in the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong>.
CHAPTER X<br />
The German Southern Shoulder<br />
Is Jammed<br />
In the first week of December the 4th<br />
Infantry Division (Maj. Gen. Raymond<br />
O. Barton) left the VII Corps after a<br />
month of bloody operations in the Hurtgen<br />
Forest. Having lost over 5,000 battle<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties and 2,500 nonbattle c<strong>as</strong>ualties<br />
from trench foot and exposure, the division<br />
now had to be rebuilt to something<br />
approaching its former combat effectiveness.<br />
It moved south to Luxembourg,<br />
“the quiet paradise for weary troops,”<br />
<strong>as</strong> one report names it, taking over the<br />
83d Infantry Division positions on the<br />
right flank of the VIII Corps (and First<br />
<strong>Army</strong>) while the 83d occupied the old<br />
4th Division sector in the north. The<br />
35-mile front <strong>as</strong>signed to the 4th Division<br />
conformed to the west bank of<br />
the Sauer and Moselle Rivers. Across<br />
these rivers lay a heterogeneous collection<br />
of German units whose lack of activity<br />
in p<strong>as</strong>t weeks promised the rest the<br />
4th Division needed so badly. The division<br />
completed its concentration within<br />
the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg on the<br />
13th, its three regiments deployed <strong>as</strong><br />
they would be when the German attack<br />
came. The 12th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> on the left<br />
(next to the 9th Armored Division)<br />
and fronting on the Sauer; the 8th Infantry<br />
w<strong>as</strong> in the center, deployed on<br />
both the Sauer and Moselle; the 22d Infantry<br />
reached to the right along the<br />
Moselle until it touched the First and<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> boundary just beyond the<br />
Luxembourg border. <strong>Of</strong> the three regiments<br />
only the 12th Infantry (Col. Robert<br />
H. Chance) lay in the path of the<br />
projected German counteroffensive. 1<br />
(See Map V.)<br />
As soon <strong>as</strong> it reached the quiet VIII<br />
Corps area, the 4th Infantry Division<br />
began to send groups of its veterans on<br />
leave-to Paris, to Arlon in Belgium,<br />
even a fortunate few to the United<br />
States. Rotation in the line allowed<br />
1 Histories have been published for three of the<br />
units involved in the defense described in this<br />
section: Col. Gerden F. Johnson, <strong>History</strong> of the<br />
Twelfth Infantry Regiment in World War II<br />
(Boston: National Fourth (Ivy) Division Associ-<br />
ation, 1947); <strong>History</strong> of the Eleventh Infantry<br />
Regiment, Fifth Infantry Division (Baton Rouge:<br />
<strong>Army</strong> and Navy Publishing Company, 1946); and<br />
Lester M. Nichols, Impact, The Battle Story of<br />
the Tenth Armored Division (New York: Brad-<br />
bury, Sales, O’Neill, 1954). The combat interviews<br />
are excellent for the 4th Division, less useful for<br />
the 10th Armored. The 4th Division AAR pro-<br />
vides a good narrative but the division journals<br />
are scanty. <strong>Of</strong> the regiments only the 12th In-<br />
fantry h<strong>as</strong> much information in its AAR and unit<br />
journal. The AAR of the 70th Tank Battalion<br />
can be used to flesh out much of the story. For<br />
the participation of the 10th Armored troops, see<br />
the 10th Armored G–3 journal and the CCA<br />
AAR. An interesting account by a participant<br />
will be found in Maj. Glenn W. Zarger’s manu-<br />
script, Defense of Little Switzerland, prepared for<br />
the Advanced <strong>Of</strong>ficers Cl<strong>as</strong>s No. I, Armored<br />
School, Fort Knox, Ky., 1 May 1948.
THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 239<br />
others a few hours in Luxembourg City,<br />
ice cream in several flavors, well-watered<br />
beer, and the dubious ple<strong>as</strong>ure of hear-<br />
ing accordionists squeeze out German<br />
waltzes and Yankee marching songs of<br />
World War I vintage. Replacements,<br />
now by order named “reinforcements,”<br />
joined the division, but by mid-Decem-<br />
ber the regiments still averaged five to<br />
six hundred men understrength. Infan-<br />
try replacements were particularly hard<br />
to obtain and many rifle companies re-<br />
mained at no better than half strength.<br />
Equipment, which had been in use since<br />
the Normandy landings, w<strong>as</strong> in poor con-<br />
dition. A number of the divisional ve-<br />
hicles had broken down en route to<br />
Luxembourg: a part of the artillery w<strong>as</strong><br />
in divisional ordnance shops for repair.<br />
When the Germans attacked, the 70th<br />
Tank Battalion, attached to the 4th Di-<br />
vision, had only eleven of its fifty-four<br />
medium tanks in running condition.<br />
Neither the 83d Division, which the<br />
4th had relieved, nor any higher head-<br />
quarters considered the Germans in this<br />
sector to be capable of making more<br />
than local attacks or raids, and patrols<br />
from the 4th Division found nothing to<br />
change this estimate. Even so General<br />
Barton made careful disposition of his<br />
understrength and weary division, even<br />
ordering the divisional rest camps, orig-<br />
inally back <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Arlon, to be moved<br />
to sites forward of the regimental com-<br />
mand posts. Since any static linear de-<br />
fense w<strong>as</strong> out of the question because of<br />
the length of the front and the meander-<br />
ing course of the two rivers, Barton in-<br />
structed his regimental commanders to<br />
maintain only small forces at the river<br />
outpost line, holding the main strength,<br />
generally separate companies, in the vil-<br />
lages nearby. Each regiment had one bat-<br />
talion <strong>as</strong> a mobile reserve, capable of<br />
moving on four-hour notice. Each regi-<br />
ment, by standard practice on such a<br />
wide front, had one of the division’s<br />
105-mm. howitzer battalions in direct<br />
support. General support w<strong>as</strong> provided<br />
by the division’s own 155-mm. howitzer<br />
battalion and two additional medium<br />
battalions belonging to the 422d Field<br />
Artillery Group, but even this added<br />
firepower did not permit the 4th Di-<br />
vision m<strong>as</strong>sed fire at any point on the<br />
extended front. Mobile support w<strong>as</strong> pro-<br />
vided by those tanks of the 70th Tank<br />
Battalion which were operational, the<br />
self-propelled tank destroyers of the 803d<br />
Tank Destroyer Battalion, and the<br />
towed tank destroyers of the 802d The<br />
plans to utilize these positions were<br />
briefed by General Barton to his com-<br />
manders on the 13th. Barton w<strong>as</strong> appre-<br />
hensive that the enemy would attempt<br />
a raid in force to seize Luxembourg City,<br />
and in the battle beginning on the 16th<br />
he would view Luxembourg City <strong>as</strong> the<br />
main German objective.<br />
Intelligence reports indicated that the<br />
4th Division w<strong>as</strong> confronted by the 212th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division and miscella-<br />
neous “fortress” units, deployed on a<br />
front equal to that held by the 4th. Un-<br />
til the night of 14 December this estimate<br />
w<strong>as</strong> correct. As yet no American troops<br />
had had opportunity to try the mettle of<br />
the 212th (Generalmajor Franz Sens-<br />
fuss) . After three years of campaigning<br />
on the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front the division had<br />
been so badly shattered during with-<br />
drawals in the Lithuanian sector that<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> taken from the line and sent to<br />
Poland, in September 1944, for over-<br />
hauling. The replacements received,<br />
mostly from upper Bavaria, were judged<br />
better than the average although t<strong>here</strong>
240 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
were many seventeen-year-olds. Unit<br />
commanders and noncommissioned offi-<br />
cers were good and experienced; morale<br />
w<strong>as</strong> high. Although the 212th w<strong>as</strong> at<br />
full strength it shared the endemic weak-<br />
nesses of the volks grenadier division:<br />
insufficient communications and fewer<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns than provided by regulation<br />
(only four were with the division on 16<br />
December).<br />
Brandenberger rated the 212th <strong>as</strong> his<br />
best division. For this re<strong>as</strong>on the 212th<br />
w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed the mission of protecting<br />
the flank of the Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, just <strong>as</strong><br />
the latter w<strong>as</strong> responsible for guarding<br />
the flank of the forces in the main<br />
counteroffensive. More specifically, the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> plans called for the 212th<br />
to attack over the Sauer on either side<br />
of Echternach, reach and hold the line<br />
of the Schlammbach, thus eliminating<br />
the American artillery on the plateau<br />
in the Alttrier-Herborn-Mompach area,<br />
and finally to contain <strong>as</strong> many additional<br />
American troops <strong>as</strong> possible by a thrust<br />
toward Junglinster. Radio Luxembourg,<br />
the powerful station used for Allied<br />
propaganda broadc<strong>as</strong>ts, w<strong>as</strong> situated<br />
near Junglinster. As in the c<strong>as</strong>e of the<br />
276th Volks Grenadier Division, t<strong>here</strong> is<br />
no indication that the LXXX Corps ex-<br />
pected to send the 212th into Luxem-<br />
bourg City, although the Germans knew<br />
that the 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group Headquarters<br />
and the advance command post of the<br />
Ninth Air Force were located t<strong>here</strong>.<br />
On the night of 13–14 December the<br />
212th commenced to strip its extended<br />
front in concentration for its part in the<br />
counteroffensive. The 423d Regiment<br />
made a forced march from the sector<br />
southwest of Trier and by daylight had<br />
bivouacked on the right wing of the<br />
212th. The following night all three<br />
regiments <strong>as</strong>sembled behind a single bat-<br />
talion which acted <strong>as</strong> a screen along the<br />
Sauer between Bollendorf and Ralingen,<br />
the prospective zone of attack. On the<br />
final night (15-16 December) the divi-<br />
sion moved into the position for the<br />
jump-off: the 423d on the right, north of<br />
Echternach; the 320th on the left, w<strong>here</strong><br />
the Sauer turned e<strong>as</strong>t of Echternach; and<br />
the 316th in army reserve northe<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
the city. The long southern flank of the<br />
old 212th Volks Grenadier Division sec-<br />
tor had been dr<strong>as</strong>tically weakened to<br />
permit the concentration at Echternach.<br />
Only two Festung battalions were left to<br />
cover the twelve miles south to the<br />
boundary between the Seventh and<br />
First Armies, but in this denuded sector<br />
the Sauer and Moselle Rivers afforded<br />
a considerable natural defense.<br />
The Germans had excellent intelli-<br />
gence of the 4th Infantry Division<br />
strength and positions. The Luxem-<br />
bourg-German border w<strong>as</strong> e<strong>as</strong>ily crossed,<br />
and despite the best efforts of the Amer-<br />
ican Counter Intelligence Corps and the<br />
local police the bars and restaurants in<br />
Luxembourg City provided valuable<br />
listening posts for German agents. It is<br />
likely that the enemy had spotted all the<br />
American outpost and artillery positions;<br />
it is certain he knew that the 212th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division would be opposed<br />
only by the 12th Infantry during the<br />
first <strong>as</strong>sault ph<strong>as</strong>e.<br />
The German Thrust Begins<br />
When the German artillery opened up<br />
on the 12th Infantry at H-hour for the<br />
counteroffensive, the concentration fired<br />
on the company and battalion command<br />
posts w<strong>as</strong> accurate and effective. By day-<br />
break all wire communication forward of
THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 241<br />
the battalions w<strong>as</strong> severed. Many radios<br />
were in the repair shops, and those at<br />
outposts had a very limited range over<br />
the abrupt and broken terrain around<br />
Echternach and Berdorf, Luxembourg’s<br />
“Little Switzerland.” Throughout this<br />
first day the 12th Infantry would fight<br />
with very poor communication. The<br />
problem of regimental control and co-<br />
ordination w<strong>as</strong> heightened by the wide<br />
but necessary dispersion of its units on<br />
an extended front and the tactical isola-<br />
tion in an area of wooded heights<br />
chopped by gorges and huge crev<strong>as</strong>ses.<br />
In accordance with the division orders to<br />
hold back maximum reserves, the 12th<br />
Infantry had only five companies in the<br />
line, located in villages athwart the main<br />
and secondary roads leading southwest<br />
from the Sauer River crossings to the in-<br />
terior of the Grand Duchy. These vil-<br />
lages, at which the crucial engagements<br />
would be fought, were Berdorf, Echter-<br />
nach, Lauterborn, Osweiler, and Dick-<br />
weiler. Actually, only a few men were<br />
stationed with the company command<br />
post in each village; the rifle platoons<br />
and weapon sections were dispersed in<br />
outposts overlooking the Sauer, some of<br />
them <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> 2,000 yards from their<br />
company headquarters.<br />
The leading companies of the two<br />
German <strong>as</strong>sault regiments began crossing<br />
the Sauer before dawn. Apparently the<br />
crews manning the rubber boats had<br />
trouble with the swift current, and<br />
t<strong>here</strong> were too few craft to accommodate<br />
large detachments. The immediate ob-<br />
jective of the northern regiment, the<br />
423d, w<strong>as</strong> the plateau on which stood<br />
the village of Berdorf; beyond this the<br />
regiment had orders to cut the road<br />
running west from Lauterborn and Ech-<br />
ternach and link forces with the 320th<br />
Regiment. The latter crossed e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Echternach, its first objective being the<br />
series of hills north of Dickweiler and<br />
Osweiler. Once in possession of these<br />
hills the 320th w<strong>as</strong> to seize the two vil-<br />
lages, then drive on to join the 423d.<br />
General Barton had warned his regi-<br />
ments at 0929 to be on the alert because<br />
of activity reported to the north in the<br />
28th Division area, intelligence con-<br />
firmed by a phone call from General<br />
Middleton. But the first word that the<br />
Germans were across the river reached<br />
the 12th Infantry command post in Jung-<br />
linster at 1015, with a report from<br />
Company F, in Berdorf, that a 15-man<br />
patrol had been seen approaching the<br />
village a half-hour earlier. At Berdorf<br />
most of Company F (1st Lt. John L.<br />
Leake) had been on outpost duty at the<br />
four observation posts fronting the river.<br />
The company radio w<strong>as</strong> back for repair<br />
but each of the artillery observers, for-<br />
ward, had a radio. Either these sets failed<br />
to function or the outposts were sur-<br />
prised before a message could get out.<br />
The 1st Battalion, 423d Regiment, over-<br />
ran three of the outpost positions, cap-<br />
tured the company mortars, machine<br />
guns, and antitank guns sited in support<br />
of the forward detachments, and moved<br />
in on Berdorf. Outpost 2 at Birkelt<br />
Farm, a mile and a half e<strong>as</strong>t of Berdorf,<br />
somehow escaped surprise. Here the 2d<br />
Platoon (with twenty-one men and two<br />
artillery observers) held out in the stone<br />
farm buildings for four days and from<br />
this position har<strong>as</strong>sed the Germans mov-<br />
ing up the ravine road to Berdorf. Direct<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault failed to dislodge these Ameri-<br />
cans, and the attempt w<strong>as</strong> abandoned<br />
pending the arrival of heavy weapons<br />
from across the river.<br />
At Berdorf itself, Lieutenant Leake
242<br />
gat<strong>here</strong>d about sixty men in the Parc<br />
Hotel <strong>as</strong> the enemy closed in. The Parc<br />
w<strong>as</strong> a three-storied reinforced concrete<br />
resort hotel (indicated in the guide-<br />
books <strong>as</strong> having “confort moderne”) sur-<br />
rounded by open ground. Leake’s force<br />
had only one .50-caliber machine gun<br />
and a BAR to reinforce the rifles in the<br />
hands of the defenders, but the Germans<br />
were so discouraged by the reception<br />
given their initial sorties that their suc-<br />
ceeding attempts to take the building<br />
were markedly half hearted.<br />
Meanwhile the 7th Company, 423d<br />
Regiment, pushed forward to cut the<br />
Echternach-Lüxembourg road, the one<br />
first-cl<strong>as</strong>s highway in the 12th Infantry<br />
sector. This company struck Lauterborn,<br />
on the road a mile and a half southwest<br />
of Echternach, and cut off the Company<br />
G outposts. By 1130 the remainder of<br />
Company G, armed with rifles and one<br />
BAR, w<strong>as</strong> surrounded but still fighting<br />
at a mill just north of the village, while<br />
a platoon of the 2d Battalion weapons<br />
company held on in a few buildings at<br />
the west edge of Lauterborn. Company<br />
E, in Echternach, likewise w<strong>as</strong> surprised<br />
but many of the outpost troops worked<br />
their way back to a hat factory, on the<br />
southwestern edge of the city, which had<br />
been organized <strong>as</strong> a strongpoint. The<br />
first German <strong>as</strong>sault <strong>here</strong> did not strike<br />
until about 1100, although Echternach<br />
lay on low ground directly at the edge of<br />
the river. Attempts by the 320th Infan-<br />
try to make a predawn crossing at Ech-<br />
ternach had been frustrated by the swift<br />
current, and finally all the <strong>as</strong>sault com-<br />
panies were put over the Sauer at Edin-<br />
gen, more than three miles downstream.<br />
This delay brought the advance troops<br />
of the 320th onto the hills above Os-<br />
weiler and Dickweiler well after day-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
light, and almost all of the American<br />
outposts were able to fall back on the<br />
villages intact. Late in the morning two<br />
enemy companies attacked Dickweiler,<br />
defended by Company I, but were<br />
beaten off by mortar fire, small arms,<br />
and a .50-caliber machine gun taken<br />
from a half-track. The Germans with-<br />
drew to some woods about 800 yards to<br />
the north, ending the action; apparently<br />
the 320th w<strong>as</strong> more concerned with get-<br />
ting its incoming troops through Echter-<br />
nach. Osweiler, west of Dickweiler, thus<br />
far had seen no enemy.<br />
With wire shot out, radios failing, and<br />
outposts overrun, only a confused and<br />
fragmentary picture of the scope and in-<br />
tent of the attack w<strong>as</strong> available in the<br />
4th Infantry Division headquarters. By<br />
noon, however, with Berdorf and Ech-<br />
ternach known to be under attack, Dick-<br />
weiler hit in force, and Lauterborn re-<br />
ported to be surrounded, it w<strong>as</strong> clear that<br />
the Germans at the very le<strong>as</strong>t were en-<br />
gaged in an extensive “reconnaissance in<br />
force,” thus far confined to the 12th In-<br />
fantry sector. Artillery, normally the<br />
first supporting weapon to be brought<br />
into play by the division, had very<br />
limited effect at this stage. The field ar-<br />
tillery battalions were widely dispersed<br />
behind the various sections of the long<br />
4th Division front; only fifteen pieces<br />
from the 42d Field Artillery Battalion<br />
and the regimental cannon company<br />
were in range to help the 12th Infantry.<br />
The one liaison plane flying observation<br />
for the gunners (the other w<strong>as</strong> shot up<br />
early on 16 December) reported that<br />
“the area w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong> full of targets <strong>as</strong> a pin-<br />
ball machine,” but little could be done<br />
about it. Radio communication, poor <strong>as</strong><br />
it w<strong>as</strong>, had to serve, with the artillery<br />
network handling most of the infantry
THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 243<br />
and command messages in addition to its<br />
own calls for fire. The gunners neverthe-<br />
less began to get on the targets, and the<br />
German infantry reported very punish-<br />
ing artillery fire during the afternoon.<br />
At noon the picture of battle had<br />
sharper definition; so General Barton<br />
authorized the 12th Infantry to commit<br />
the 1st Battalion (Lt. Col. Oma R.<br />
Bates), the regimental reserve. At the<br />
same time he gave Colonel Chance eight<br />
medium tanks and ten light tanks,<br />
leaving the 70th Tank Battalion (Lt.<br />
Col. Henry E. Davidson, Jr.) with only<br />
three mediums and a platoon of light<br />
tanks in running order. Small tank-infan-<br />
try teams quickly formed and went for-<br />
ward to relieve or reinforce the hard-<br />
pressed companies. Unfortunately rain<br />
and snow, during the days just p<strong>as</strong>t, had<br />
turned the countryside to mud, and the<br />
tanks were bound to the roads. Later<br />
Barton phoned the corps commander to<br />
<strong>as</strong>k for reinforcements. Middleton had<br />
nothing to offer but the 159th Engineer<br />
(Combat) Battalion, which w<strong>as</strong> working<br />
on the roads. He told Barton that if he<br />
could find the engineers he could use<br />
them.<br />
Company A, mounted on a platoon of<br />
light tanks, w<strong>as</strong> ordered to open the<br />
main road to Lauterborn and Echter-<br />
nach which supplied the 2d Battalion<br />
(Maj. John W. Gorn) . This team fought<br />
through some scattered opposition south-<br />
west of Lauterborn, dropped off a rifle<br />
platoon to hold Hill 313 (which com-<br />
manded the southern approach), and<br />
moved through the village to the Com-<br />
pany G command post, freeing twenty-<br />
five men who had been taken prisoner<br />
in the morning. By nightfall the Ger-<br />
mans had been driven back some dis-<br />
tance from Lauterborn (they showed no<br />
wish to close with the tanks), but the<br />
decision w<strong>as</strong> made to dig in for the night<br />
alongside Company G rather than risk a<br />
drive toward Echternach in the dark.<br />
Companies A and G together now<br />
totaled about a hundred officers and<br />
men.<br />
Early in the afternoon Company B<br />
mounted five light and five medium<br />
tanks and set out to reach Company F.<br />
At the southern entrance to Berdorf,<br />
which is strung out along the plateau<br />
road for three-quarters of a mile, the re-<br />
lief force ran into a part of the 1st Bat-<br />
talion, 423d Regiment, which opened<br />
bazooka fire from the houses. When<br />
darkness fell the Americans still were<br />
held in check, and the infantry drew<br />
back, with two tanks in support, and dug<br />
in for the night. The rest of the tanks<br />
returned to Consdorf for g<strong>as</strong>oline and<br />
ammunition.<br />
The morning situation in the sector<br />
held by the 3d Battalion (Maj. Herman<br />
R. Rice, Jr.) had not seemed too press-<br />
ing. The 320th had not reached Osweiler<br />
and the first <strong>as</strong>sault at Dickweiler had<br />
been repulsed handily. But Colonel<br />
Chance sent out all of the usable tanks<br />
in Company B, 70th Tank battalion–a<br />
total of three–to pick up a rifle squad<br />
at the 3d Battalion command post (lo-<br />
cated at Herborn) and clear the road to<br />
Osweiler. When this little force reached<br />
Osweiler, word had just come in that<br />
Dickweiler w<strong>as</strong> threatened by another<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault. The tanks and riflemen pro-<br />
ceeded to run a 2,000-yard gauntlet of<br />
bursting shells along the high, exposed<br />
road to Dickweiler (probably the enemy<br />
guns beyond the Sauer were firing inter-<br />
diction by the map).<br />
The little column came in on the flank<br />
of the 2d Battalion, 320th Regiment,
244 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> in the process of moving two<br />
companies forward in attack formation<br />
across the open ground northwest of<br />
Dickweiler. The tanks opened fire on<br />
the German flank and rear, while all the<br />
infantry weapons in the village blazed<br />
away. Thirty-five of the enemy, including<br />
one company commander, surrendered;<br />
the commander of the second company<br />
w<strong>as</strong> killed, <strong>as</strong> were at le<strong>as</strong>t fifty soldiers.<br />
Later the 4th Infantry Division historian<br />
w<strong>as</strong> able to write: “This German battal-<br />
ion is clearly traceable through the rest<br />
of the operation, a beaten and ineffective<br />
unit.”<br />
But the 320th Regiment, although<br />
badly shaken in its first attempts to take<br />
Dickweiler, w<strong>as</strong> rapidly incre<strong>as</strong>ing the<br />
number of its troops in this area, spread-<br />
ing across the main road and encircling<br />
the two villages. About an hour after<br />
dark a message from the 3d Battalion<br />
reached the 12th Infantry command<br />
post: “Situation desperate. L and I com-<br />
pletely surrounded.” Colonel Chance<br />
took Company C, the l<strong>as</strong>t troops of the<br />
12th Infantry, and sent them to the 3d<br />
Battalion command post for use on the<br />
morrow.<br />
The 12th Infantry had rigidly obeyed<br />
the division commander’s order that<br />
t<strong>here</strong> should be “no retrograde move-<br />
ment,” despite the fact that nine days<br />
earlier it had been rated “a badly deci-<br />
mated and weary regiment” and that on<br />
16 December its rifle companies still<br />
were much understrength. The 42d<br />
Field Artillery Battalion in direct sup-<br />
port of the 12th, though forced to dis-<br />
place several times during the day be-<br />
cause of accurate counterbattery fire, had<br />
given the German infantry a severe<br />
jolting.<br />
In the face of the German build-up<br />
opposite the 12th Infantry and the ap-<br />
parent absence of enemy activity else-<br />
w<strong>here</strong> on the division front, General<br />
Barton began the process of regrouping<br />
to meet the attack. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no guaran-<br />
tee, however, that the enemy had com-<br />
mitted all his forces; the situation would<br />
have to develop further before the 4th<br />
Division commander could draw heavily<br />
on the two regiments not yet engaged.<br />
The 2d Battalion of the 22d Infantry,<br />
in regimental reserve, w<strong>as</strong> alerted to<br />
move by truck at daylight on 17 Decem-<br />
ber to the 12th Infantry command post<br />
at Junglinster, t<strong>here</strong> to be joined by two<br />
tank platoons. The 9th Armored Divi-<br />
sion loaned a medium tank company<br />
from the 19th Tank Battalion, also to<br />
report to the 12th Infantry on the fol-<br />
lowing morning. Three battalions of<br />
155’s and two batteries of 105-mm. how-<br />
itzers began the shift north to reinforce<br />
the fifteen howitzers supporting the 12th<br />
Infantry. And the division reserve, the<br />
4th Engineer Combat Battalion and<br />
4th Cavalry Reconnaissance Troop,<br />
concentrated behind the 12th Infantry<br />
lines. Most important, just before mid-<br />
night the corps commander telephoned<br />
General Barton that a part of the 10th<br />
Armored Division would leave Thion-<br />
ville, in the Third <strong>Army</strong> area, at day-<br />
break on 17 December. The prospect<br />
must have brightened considerably at<br />
the 4th Division headquarters when the<br />
promise of this reinforcement arrived.<br />
The 4th Division would not be left to<br />
fight it out alone.<br />
On the second day of the battle both<br />
sides committed more troops. As yet the<br />
212th had no bridge, for the American<br />
artillery had shot out. the structure<br />
erected on the 16th before it could be<br />
used. The 4th Division switched all local
THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOUL DER IS JAMMED 245<br />
reserves to the threatened left flank to<br />
block further penetrations and to rein-<br />
force and relieve the garrison villages<br />
in the north. The 212th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division took a shock company from<br />
the 316th Regiment, which w<strong>as</strong> still held<br />
in reserve under Seventh <strong>Army</strong> orders,<br />
and moved it into the fight. The division<br />
fusilier battalion w<strong>as</strong> committed against<br />
the 12th Infantry center in an attempt<br />
to drive a wedge through at Scheidgen<br />
while a part of the 23d Festung Battal-<br />
ion crossed the Sauer near Girst to ex-<br />
tend the left flank of the German attack.<br />
During the night of 16 December<br />
searchlights had been brought down to<br />
the river opposite Echternach to aid the<br />
German engineers attempting to lay<br />
spans on the six stone piers, sole relic<br />
of the ancient bridge from whose exit<br />
the people of Echternach moved yearly<br />
in the “dancing procession” on the fe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of St. Willibrord. American shellfire<br />
finally drove the enemy away from the<br />
bank, necessitating a new effort in broad<br />
daylight farther to the north. The enemy<br />
infantry would outnumber the Ameri-<br />
cans opposing them in the combat area,<br />
but on 17 December the Germans in the<br />
bridgehead would meet a far greater<br />
weight of artillery fire than they could<br />
direct against the Americans and would<br />
find it difficult to deal with American<br />
tanks. The superiority in tanks main-<br />
tained by the 4th Infantry Division<br />
throughout this operation would effec-<br />
tively checkmate the larger numbers of<br />
the German infantry.<br />
Fighting on 17 December took place<br />
along the axes of three principal German<br />
penetrations: on the American left flank<br />
at Berdorf, Consdorf, and Mullerthal; in<br />
the center along the Echternach-Lauter-<br />
born-Scheidgen road; and on the right in<br />
the Osweiler-Dickweiler sector.<br />
About three hours before dawn, Gen-<br />
eral Barton, concerned over his left<br />
flank, dispatched the 4th Engineer Com-<br />
bat Battalion and 4th Cavalry Recon-<br />
naissance Troop to Breitweiler, a small<br />
village overlooking the wishbone ter-<br />
minus of the Schwarz Erntz gorge and<br />
the ganglia ravine roads which branched<br />
thence into the 12th Infantry flank and<br />
rear. The Schwarz Erntz gorge lay with-<br />
in the 4th Infantry Division zone but in<br />
fact provided a natural cleavage between<br />
the 4th Division and the 9th Armored<br />
Division. Both units would t<strong>here</strong>fore be<br />
involved in guarding the cross-corridors<br />
and ravines which stemmed from the<br />
gorge itself. The advance of the 423d<br />
Regiment across the Berdorf plateau on<br />
16 December had reached the winding<br />
defile leading down into the gorge west<br />
of Berdorf village, t<strong>here</strong> wiping out a<br />
squad of infantry and one 57-mm. anti-<br />
tank gun which had been placed <strong>here</strong> to<br />
block the gorge road. When the 4th Divi-<br />
sion reserves arrived in Breitweiler on<br />
the morning of 17 December the threat<br />
of a flanking move through the gorge<br />
w<strong>as</strong> very real but the Americans had<br />
time to dig in.<br />
At 0936 American observers reported<br />
a very large force moving along the<br />
bottom of the gorge, and at 1044, “5<br />
companies counted and still coming.”<br />
What had been seen were troops of the<br />
987th Regiment, the reserve regiment<br />
of the 276th Volks Grenadier Division,<br />
then attacking in the 9th Armored Divi-<br />
sion sector. Company C, 70th Tank Bat-<br />
talion, now had eight tanks in running<br />
condition and these were hurried to<br />
Breitweiler to reinforce the cavalry and<br />
engineers. Two platoons from Company<br />
A, 19th Tank Battalion, which had just
246<br />
arrived from the 9th Armored, the <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault gun and mortar platoons of the<br />
70th Tank Battalion, a battery of 105-<br />
mm. howitzers, the reconnaissance com-<br />
pany of the 803d Tank Destroyer Battal-<br />
ion, and the 2d Battalion, 8th Infantry,<br />
were h<strong>as</strong>tily <strong>as</strong>sembled in Colbet, a mile<br />
and a half south of Müllerthal, and<br />
organized at 1104 <strong>as</strong> T<strong>as</strong>k Force Luckett<br />
(Col. James S. Luckett) .<br />
An hour earlier the tank destroyer<br />
reconnaissance company had begun a<br />
long-range fire fight but the German ad-<br />
vance guard, despite heavy shelling from<br />
three field artillery battalions and every<br />
self-propelled piece which could be<br />
brought to bear, drove straight on to<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
BREITWEILER<br />
Müllerthal. Consdorf, the command post<br />
of the 2d Battalion, 12th Infantry, w<strong>as</strong><br />
left open to an attack from Müllerthal<br />
up the Hertgrund ravine. Major Gorn<br />
organized a h<strong>as</strong>ty defense with a few<br />
cooks, MP’s, stragglers, and one tank, but<br />
the blow did not fall. The 987th Regi-<br />
ment failed to emerge from the gorge<br />
and even may have withdrawn from<br />
Mullerthal, after beating off the counter-<br />
attack launched t<strong>here</strong> in the afternoon<br />
by elements of the 9th Armored Divi-<br />
sion.<br />
The failure on the part of the 987th<br />
to push p<strong>as</strong>t Mullerthal on 17 December<br />
or to overflow from the gorge onto the<br />
flanks of the two American units remains
THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 247<br />
a mystery. Possibly this failure is ex-<br />
plained by the lack of heavy weapons<br />
needed to bl<strong>as</strong>t a way up from the gorge<br />
bottom. Possibly the American artillery<br />
and self-propelled guns had disorganized<br />
and disheartened the German infantry;<br />
prisoners later reported that shell frag-<br />
ments from the tree bursts in the bottom<br />
of the wooded gorge “sounded like fall-<br />
ing apples” and caused heavy c<strong>as</strong>ualties.<br />
Whatever the re<strong>as</strong>on, this enemy pene-<br />
tration went no further than Müllerthal.<br />
By early afternoon, however, a new<br />
threat w<strong>as</strong> looming in the Consdorf area,<br />
this time from an enemy penetration on<br />
the right along the Scheidgen section of<br />
the main highroad to Echternach. This<br />
turned out to be only a patrol action and<br />
the enemy w<strong>as</strong> quickly beaten off.<br />
Early in the day Company B and ten<br />
tanks from the 70th Tank Battalion re-<br />
newed the attack at Berdorf in an at-<br />
tempt to break through to Company F,<br />
still encircled at the opposite end of the<br />
village. This time the tanks deployed on<br />
the roads and trails south of Berdorf and<br />
moved in with five riflemen on each tank<br />
deck. The five medium tanks drove<br />
through to the northe<strong>as</strong>tern edge and<br />
just before noon began shelling the Parc<br />
Hotel in the mistaken belief that it w<strong>as</strong><br />
held by the enemy. One of the Company<br />
F men had been rummaging about and<br />
had found an American flag. This w<strong>as</strong><br />
unfurled on the shattered roof. Contact<br />
thus established, an <strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong> launched<br />
to clear Berdorf. But the Germans de-<br />
fending the houses were heavily armed<br />
with bazook<strong>as</strong> and the tanks made little<br />
progress. At dark the Americans drew<br />
back to the hotel, while the Germans<br />
pl<strong>as</strong>tered the area with rockets, artillery,<br />
and mortar shells, lobbed in from across<br />
the river. 2<br />
In the central sector Companies A and<br />
G, with five light tanks, started from<br />
Lauterborn along the road to Echter-<br />
nach. The enemy <strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> in consider-<br />
able strength and had established<br />
observation posts on the ridges ringing<br />
Lauterborn and bordering the road.<br />
Heavy and accurate shellfire followed<br />
each American move. When the day<br />
ended the relief force had accomplished<br />
no more than consolidating a defensive<br />
position in Lauterborn. In Echternach<br />
Company E, 12th Infantry, had occupied<br />
a two-block strongpoint from which it<br />
har<strong>as</strong>sed the German troops trying to<br />
move through the town. No large-scale<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong> attempted this day, appar-<br />
ently because the enemy w<strong>as</strong> still wait-<br />
ing for guns to cross the river. Troops<br />
from the 320th Regiment and fusilier<br />
battalion circled around Echternach and<br />
Lauterborn meanwhile in an attempt to<br />
cut the main road at Scheidgen. The<br />
platoon from Company A, 12th Infantry,<br />
which had been posted on Hill 313 the<br />
day before, fell back to Scheidgen and<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> overwhelmed after a l<strong>as</strong>t mes-<br />
sage pleading for tank destroyers. At the<br />
day’s end only the regimental antitank<br />
company, numbering some sixty men,<br />
stood between the enemy and the 2d<br />
Battalion command post at Consdorf.<br />
Although the German penetrations on<br />
the left and in the center of the 12th<br />
Infantry sector deepened during the day,<br />
the situation on the right w<strong>as</strong> relatively<br />
encouraging. At the break of day on 17<br />
December Company C, the 12th Infantry<br />
reserve, moved out of Herborn en route<br />
2 1st Sgt. Gervis Willis later w<strong>as</strong> awarded the<br />
DSC for his conduct in the defense of Berdorf.
248<br />
to join the two companies beleaguered<br />
in Osweiler. As Company C worked its<br />
way through the woods south of Osweiler<br />
the left platoon ran head on into the<br />
2d Battalion. 320th Infantry; all the<br />
platoon members were killed or cap-<br />
tured. By some chance the two platoons<br />
on the right missed the German hive. In<br />
the meantime the 2d Battalion, 22d In-<br />
fantry (Lt. Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> A. Kenan), had<br />
arrived in the 12th Infantry zone. Com-<br />
pany F w<strong>as</strong> mounted on tanks from the<br />
19th Tank Battalion, which had just<br />
come in from the 9th Armored Division,<br />
and also set out for Osweiler. This force<br />
arrived on the scene shortly after the<br />
enactment of the German ambush,<br />
fought a short sharp engagement, res-<br />
cued some of the prisoners from Com-<br />
pany C, and pushed on into Osweiler.<br />
With this reinforcement a new de-<br />
fensive line w<strong>as</strong> organized on the hills<br />
just e<strong>as</strong>t of the village. The original de-<br />
fenders had taken a large bag of prison-<br />
ers the previous day; these were sent<br />
back to Herborn with a tank platoon. In<br />
midafternoon the remaining companies<br />
of the 2d Battalion, 22d Infantry, started<br />
for Osweiler, advancing in column<br />
through the woods which topped a ridge<br />
line running southwest of the village.<br />
While the American column moved in<br />
a northe<strong>as</strong>terly direction, a German col-<br />
umn, probably a battalion in strength,<br />
suddenly intersected the 2d Battalion<br />
line of march. In the fire fight which<br />
followed the 2d Battalion companies be-<br />
came separated, but the early winter<br />
darkness soon ended the skirmish. The<br />
Americans dug in for the night, and the<br />
Germans p<strong>as</strong>sed on toward Scheidgen.<br />
In Dickweiler the troops of the 3d<br />
Battalion, 12th Infantry, had been har-<br />
<strong>as</strong>sed by small forays from the woods<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
above the village. The three tanks which<br />
had come up the evening before, and<br />
very effective fire by American batteries,<br />
put an end to these German efforts. Thus<br />
both Osweiler and Dickweiler remained<br />
tight in American hands. <strong>To</strong>ward the<br />
close of day Company C of the 12th In-<br />
fantry took position on some high<br />
ground between and slightly south of the<br />
two villages, thus extending the line<br />
<strong>here</strong> on the right.<br />
General Barton’s headquarters saw<br />
the situation on the evening of 17 De-<br />
cember <strong>as</strong> follows. The 3d Battalion and<br />
its reinforcements had “a semblance of<br />
a line” to meet further penetration in<br />
the vicinity of Osweiler and Dickweiler.<br />
On the opposite flank things were tem-<br />
porarily under control, with T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Luckett not yet seriously engaged and<br />
the enemy advance thus far checked at<br />
Mullerthal. However, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a pres-<br />
ent danger that the large German force<br />
might turn the 4th Division flank by a<br />
successful attack through the 9th Ar-<br />
mored Division blocking position at<br />
Waldbillig. All that could be said of the<br />
12th Infantry center w<strong>as</strong> that the situa-<br />
tion w<strong>as</strong> fluid, for <strong>here</strong> the road junction<br />
at Scheidgen w<strong>as</strong> in enemy hands and<br />
German detachments were on the loose.<br />
Across the river at the headquarters<br />
of the 212th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little realization of the extent<br />
to which the American center had been<br />
dented. General Sensfuss told his supe-<br />
riors that the 212th had made little<br />
progress beyond completing the encircle-<br />
ment of Echternach. Despite the com-<br />
plete surprise won by the 212th on 16<br />
December, it had been unable to effect<br />
either a really deep penetration or ex-<br />
tensive disorganization in the 12th In-<br />
fantry zone. With the close of the second
THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 249<br />
day it may be said that the German<br />
opportunity to exploit the initial sur-<br />
prise and attendant tactical gains com-<br />
menced to fade.<br />
On the morning of 17 December<br />
the 10th Armored Division (General<br />
Morris) had moved out of Thionville<br />
for Luxembourg, the first step (al-<br />
though at the time not realized) which<br />
General Patton’s Third <strong>Army</strong> would<br />
make to intervene in the battle of the<br />
Ardennes. General Morris drove ahead<br />
of his troops and reported to General<br />
Middleton at B<strong>as</strong>togne. The VIII Corps<br />
commander originally had intended to<br />
use a part of the 10th Armored in direct<br />
support of the 28th Division, but now he<br />
instructed Morris to send one combat<br />
command to the B<strong>as</strong>togne area and to<br />
commit the remainder of the 10th Ar-<br />
mored with the 4th Infantry Division in<br />
a counterattack to drive the Germans<br />
back over the Sauer. General Middleton<br />
regarded the German advance against<br />
the southern shoulder of his corps <strong>as</strong><br />
potentially dangerous, both to the corps<br />
and to the command and communica-<br />
tions center at Luxembourg City. T<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong>, of course, no means by which the<br />
VIII Corps commander could know that<br />
the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> scheme of maneuver<br />
w<strong>as</strong> limited to a swing only <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong><br />
Mersch, eight miles north of the city.<br />
General Morris left B<strong>as</strong>togne and<br />
met the 4th Infantry Division com-<br />
mander in Luxembourg. The two<br />
were of one mind on the need for coun-<br />
terattack tactics and arranged that CCA<br />
(Brig. Gen. Edwin W. Piburn), the<br />
leading combat command, should make<br />
an immediate drive to the north be-<br />
tween the Schwarz Erntz gorge and the<br />
main Echternach-Luxembourg road.<br />
CCA made good speed on the 75-mile<br />
run from Thionville, but the leading<br />
armor did not arrive in the 12th In-<br />
fantry area until late in the afternoon<br />
of 17 December. Apparently some troops<br />
went at once into the line, but the ac-<br />
tual counterattack w<strong>as</strong> postponed until<br />
the next morning. Then, so the plan<br />
read, CCA would advance in three t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
forces: one through the Schwarz Erntz<br />
gorge; one on the Consdorf-Berdorf<br />
road; and the third through Scheidgen<br />
to Echternach. The infantry to the front<br />
were alerted for their role in the com-<br />
bined attack and half-tracks with radios<br />
were moved close to the line of depar-<br />
ture <strong>as</strong> relay stations in the tank-infantry<br />
communications net.<br />
The counterattack moved off on the<br />
morning of 18 December in a thick<br />
winter fog. On the left, T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Chamberlain (Lt. Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> C.<br />
Chamberlain) dispatched a small tank-<br />
infantry team from Breitweiler into the<br />
gorge. The Schwarz Erntz, taking its<br />
name from the rushing stream twisting<br />
along its bottom, is a depression lying<br />
from three to five hundred feet be-<br />
low the surrounding tableland. At sev-<br />
eral points canyonlike cliffs rise sheer<br />
for a hundred feet. The floor of the<br />
gorge is strewn with great boulders;<br />
dense patches of woods line the depres-<br />
sion and push down to the edge of the<br />
stream. In time of peace the gorge<br />
of the Schwarz Erntz offered a pictur-<br />
esque “promenade” for holiday visitors<br />
in the resort hotels at Berdorf and Beau-<br />
fort, with “bancs de repos” at conven-<br />
ient intervals. In December, 1944, the<br />
gorge represented a formidable military<br />
obstacle, difficult of traverse for both foot<br />
troops and vehicles, capable of defense<br />
by only a few.<br />
The entrance to the gorge w<strong>as</strong> SO
250 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
narrow that the tanks had to advance in<br />
single file, and only the lead tank could<br />
fire. The accompanying infantry were<br />
under constant bullet fire; and when the<br />
lead tank w<strong>as</strong> immobilized by an anti-<br />
tank projectile some time w<strong>as</strong> required<br />
to maneuver the rest of the column<br />
around it. With every yard forward, ba-<br />
zooka, bullet, and mortar fire incre<strong>as</strong>ed,<br />
but the enemy remained hidden. Finally,<br />
the Americans halted near the T in the<br />
gorge road just south of Müllerthal.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> clear that to capture Müllerthal,<br />
or even to block the southern exit from<br />
the gorge, the surrounding hills and<br />
tableland had to be won. The infan-<br />
try and engineers belonging to T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Luckett were given this mission,<br />
advancing in the afternoon to byp<strong>as</strong>s<br />
Müllerthal on the west and seize the<br />
wooded bluff standing above the gorge<br />
road north of Müllerthal. Tanks<br />
pumped seven hundred rounds into the<br />
woods to shake the Germans t<strong>here</strong>, but<br />
little time w<strong>as</strong> left in the short winter<br />
day and the foot soldiers only got across<br />
the Müllerthal-Waldbillig road.<br />
The center t<strong>as</strong>k force (Lt. Col. Miles<br />
L. Standish), which had been <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
to help the 2d Battalion, 12th Infantry,<br />
clear the enemy from Berdorf, had lit-<br />
tle better success. Elements of T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Standish were strafed by a pair<br />
of German planes but moved into Ber-<br />
dorf against only desultory opposition<br />
and before noon made contact with the<br />
two companies and six tanks already in<br />
the village. Then the German gunners<br />
laid down smoke and a bitter three-hour<br />
barrage, disabled some tanks and half-<br />
tracks, and drove the Americans to cover,<br />
When the fire lifted the attack w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
sumed, but the enemy fought stubborn-<br />
ly for each house. This house-to-house<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault gained only seventy-five yards<br />
before darkness intervened. Meanwhile<br />
the sixty-some members of Company<br />
F remained in the Parc Hotel, whose<br />
roof and upper story had been sm<strong>as</strong>hed<br />
in by German shelling. Pole charges<br />
or bazooka rounds had bl<strong>as</strong>ted a gaping<br />
hole in one side of the hotel, but thus<br />
far only one man had been wounded.<br />
Morale w<strong>as</strong> good, bolstered superbly<br />
by the company cook who did his best<br />
to emulate the “cuisine soignée” prom-<br />
ised in the hotel brochures by pre-<br />
paring hot meals in the b<strong>as</strong>ement and<br />
serving the men at their firing posts.<br />
While part of T<strong>as</strong>k Force Standish<br />
w<strong>as</strong> engaged in Berdorf, another team<br />
attacked through heavy underbrush to-<br />
ward Hill 329, e<strong>as</strong>t of Berdorf, which<br />
overlooked the road to Echternach.<br />
Despite the presence of the tanks, which<br />
<strong>here</strong> could maneuver off the road, the<br />
infantry were checked halfway to their<br />
objective by cross fire from machine<br />
guns flanking the slope and artillery<br />
fire from beyond the Sauer. About forty<br />
men were wounded, creating a problem<br />
for evacuation by this small force.<br />
The third t<strong>as</strong>k force from CCA, 10th<br />
Armored (led by Lt. Col J. R.<br />
Riley), made good progress in its attack<br />
along the Scheidgen-Lauterborn axis.<br />
Scheidgen w<strong>as</strong> retaken early in the after-<br />
noon virtually without a fight (the Ger-<br />
man battalion which had seized the<br />
village had already moved on toward the<br />
south). Five tanks and two companies<br />
of the 159th Engineer Combat Battalion,<br />
which Barton had located on the road<br />
job <strong>as</strong> promised by Middleton, then<br />
launched a surprise attack against the<br />
Germans on Hill 313, overlooking the<br />
road to Lauterborn. The tanks rolled<br />
down the road from Scheidgen with
THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 251<br />
their motors cut and caught the enemy<br />
on the slopes while the engineers moved<br />
in with marching fire. But a thick winter<br />
fog rolled in before the Americans<br />
could occupy the hill. Other elements<br />
of T<strong>as</strong>k Force Riley meanwhile had advanced<br />
to the mill beyond Lauterborn<br />
w<strong>here</strong> the command post of Company<br />
G w<strong>as</strong> located. Two tanks and two<br />
squads of riflemen continued along<br />
the main road to the hat factory<br />
at the southwestern edge of Echternach<br />
w<strong>here</strong> Company E, 12th Infantry,<br />
had established itself. Here the<br />
company w<strong>as</strong> found to be in good spirits,<br />
supplied with plenty of food and wine,<br />
and holding its own to the tune of over<br />
a hundred of the enemy killed. The<br />
tank commander offered to cover the<br />
withdrawal of Company E from the<br />
city, but Capt. Paul H. Dupuis, the senior<br />
officer in Echternach, refused on<br />
the ground that General Barton’s “110<br />
retrograde movement” order of 16 December<br />
w<strong>as</strong> still in effect. 3 As darkness<br />
settled in, the small relief force turned<br />
back to the mill north of Lauterborn,<br />
promising to return on the morrow<br />
with more troops.<br />
While CCA, 10th Armored, gave<br />
weight to the 4th Division counterattack,<br />
General Barton tried to strengthen the<br />
12th Infantry right flank in the Osweiler-<br />
Dickweiler sector. The 2d Battalion, 22d<br />
Infantry, which had met the German<br />
column in the woods west of Osweiler<br />
the day before, headed for the village<br />
on the morning of 18 December. The<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t word to reach Osweiler had been<br />
that the 2d Battalion w<strong>as</strong> under serious<br />
3 General Barton says that he told the tank<br />
commander to inform Captain Dupuis that his<br />
order to hold in Echternach w<strong>as</strong> revoked, but<br />
apparently this message w<strong>as</strong> not delivered. Ltr,<br />
Gm Barton to author, 17 Nov 59.<br />
attack in the woods; when the battalion<br />
neared the village the American tanks<br />
t<strong>here</strong> opened fire, under suspicion that<br />
this w<strong>as</strong> a German force. After two<br />
hours, and some c<strong>as</strong>ualties, a patrol<br />
bearing a white flag worked its way in<br />
close enough for recognition. Osweiler<br />
now had a garrison of one tank company<br />
and four understrength rifle companies.<br />
As the American reinforcements<br />
stiffened the right flank and the ar-<br />
mored t<strong>as</strong>k forces grappled to wrest the<br />
initiative from the enemy on the left,<br />
German troops widened and deepened<br />
the dent in the 12th Infantry center,<br />
shouldering their way southward<br />
between Scheidgen and Osweiler. The<br />
burden of this advance w<strong>as</strong> carried by<br />
battalions of the 320th Regiment (which<br />
explains the relaxing of pressure in the<br />
Osweiler-Dickweiler area) , and the ad-<br />
vance guard of the 316th Regiment<br />
which General Sensfuss had pried from<br />
the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> reserve by reporting<br />
the arrival of the 10th Armored Division.<br />
The first appearance of any enemy<br />
force deep in the center occurred near<br />
Maisons Lelligen, a collection of two<br />
or three houses on the edge of a large<br />
wood northwest of Herborn. The 12th<br />
Infantry cannon company w<strong>as</strong> just mov-<br />
ing up to a new position when fire<br />
opened from the wood. The drivers and<br />
gunners dived for cover and returned<br />
fire. After a few minutes of this ex-<br />
change Sgt. J. C. Kolinski got up, ran<br />
back to a truck, fixed a round, and fired<br />
it from a howitzer still coupled to the<br />
truck. This idea caught on and other<br />
men started to serve the howitzers,<br />
awkward <strong>as</strong> the technique w<strong>as</strong>, some<br />
firing at ranges <strong>as</strong> short <strong>as</strong> sixty yards.<br />
Ammunition at the pieces ultimately<br />
gave out, but a volunteer raced to the
252 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
rear of the column and drove an am-<br />
munition truck, its canv<strong>as</strong> smouldering<br />
from German bullets, up to the gun<br />
crews. The action l<strong>as</strong>ted for over three<br />
hours. At l<strong>as</strong>t two howitzers were man-<br />
handled into a position from which<br />
they could cover the company; guns and<br />
vehicles were laboriously turned around<br />
in the mud, and the company withdrew.<br />
Farther to the west another part of<br />
the German force which had come from<br />
Scheidgen surrounded the rear head-<br />
quarters of the 2d Battalion, 22d In-<br />
fantry, and a platoon of towed tank de-<br />
stroyers in Geyershof. Tanks en route<br />
to Osweiler got word of this situation,<br />
picked up twenty-five cannoneers from<br />
the 176th Field Artillery Battalion, and<br />
intervened in the fight. Covered by this<br />
counterattack the battalion headquar-<br />
ters withdrew to Herborn.<br />
The engagements at Geyershof and<br />
Maisons Lelligen were comparatively<br />
minor affairs, involving only small<br />
forces, but German prisoners later re-<br />
ported that their losses had been severe<br />
at both these points. This fact, com-<br />
bined with the American pressure on<br />
either shoulder of the penetration area,<br />
may explain why the enemy failed to<br />
continue the push in the center <strong>as</strong> 18<br />
December ended.<br />
The net day’s operations amounted<br />
to a stand-off. The Americans had<br />
strengthened the Osweiler-Dickweiler<br />
position, but the Germans had extended<br />
their penetration in the 12th Infantry<br />
center. Elsew<strong>here</strong> neither side clearly<br />
held the field. Enemy artillery had<br />
interdicted many of the roads in the<br />
area and had been very effective at<br />
Berdorf. American artillery, now in-<br />
cre<strong>as</strong>ed in the 12th Infantry zone, gave<br />
<strong>as</strong> good support <strong>as</strong> communications<br />
permitted and succeeded in destroying<br />
a ponton bridge at the Echternach site<br />
before it could be put in use. Both sides<br />
were forced to rely largely upon radio<br />
communication, but it would appear<br />
that the Germans had particular dif-<br />
ficulty: prisoners reported that “nobody<br />
seems to know w<strong>here</strong> anybody else is.”<br />
American intelligence officers esti-<br />
mated on 17 December that the enemy<br />
had a superiority in numbers of three<br />
to one; by the end of 18 December the<br />
balance w<strong>as</strong> somewhat restored. Losses<br />
and stragglers, however, had reduced<br />
the American infantry companies, al-<br />
ready understrength at the opening of<br />
the battle. The two companies in Berdorf<br />
reported a combined strength of sev-<br />
enty-nine men, while the 2d Battalion of<br />
the 22d Infantry listed an average of on-<br />
ly sixty in each company. The Amer-<br />
ican makeweight would have to be its<br />
armor. Lacking tanks and self-propelled<br />
artillery, the 212th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division had to rely on the infantry.<br />
Accordingly, the 316th Infantry began to<br />
cross the Sauer, moving up behind the<br />
center of the parent division.<br />
During the night of 18–19 December<br />
the 9th Armored Division (–) withdrew<br />
to a new line of defense on the left of the<br />
4th Infantry Division. Actually the 9th<br />
Armored (–) did not abandon the right<br />
flank anchor at Waldbillig and so contin-<br />
ued direct contact with the friendly<br />
forces deployed near the Waldbillig-<br />
Mullerthal road. The problem of dealing<br />
with the 987th Regiment and clearing<br />
the enemy out of the Schwarz Erntz<br />
gorge, or containing him t<strong>here</strong>, w<strong>as</strong> left<br />
to the 4th Division and CCA, 10th Ar-<br />
mored. As a result, these two units faced<br />
four German regiments in the 12th In-<br />
fantry sector. <strong>Of</strong> the 4th Division, it must
THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 253<br />
be remembered, four rifle battalions still<br />
were retained on guard along the twenty<br />
miles of the division front south of the<br />
battle area.<br />
When the Americans resumed the<br />
counterattack early on 19 December<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Luckett made another at-<br />
tempt to bring forward the extreme left<br />
flank in the gorge sector. As before, the<br />
maneuver w<strong>as</strong> a. flanking movement<br />
designed to seize the high ground over-<br />
looking Müllerthal. Troops of the 2d<br />
Battalion, 8th Infantry (Lt. Col. George<br />
Mabry), with tanks and armored field<br />
artillery firing in support, first attacked<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t from Waldbillig to take the wooded<br />
nose around which looped the Wald-<br />
billig-Müllerthal road. This advance<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made across open fields and w<strong>as</strong><br />
checked by extremely heavy shellfire.<br />
Next Mabry shifted his attack to the<br />
right so <strong>as</strong> to bring the infantry through<br />
the draw which circled the nose. Com-<br />
pany E, which had about seventy men<br />
and w<strong>as</strong> the strongest in the battalion, led<br />
off. By now the German artillery w<strong>as</strong><br />
ranged inaccurately. The c<strong>as</strong>ualties suf-<br />
fered by Company E cannot be num-<br />
bered, but have been reported <strong>as</strong> the most<br />
severe sustained by any company of the<br />
4th Division in the battle of the Ar-<br />
dennes. C<strong>as</strong>ualties among the officers left<br />
a lieutenant who had just joined the com-<br />
pany in command. Despite its losses<br />
Company E drove on, clearing the Ger-<br />
mans from the lower slopes before the<br />
recall order w<strong>as</strong> given.<br />
The division commander now called<br />
off the attack and <strong>as</strong>signed T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Luckett the mission of denying the en-<br />
emy the use of the road net at Müller-<br />
thal, a t<strong>as</strong>k which could be accomplished<br />
in less costly f<strong>as</strong>hion. Colonel Luckett<br />
deployed his troops along the ridge<br />
southwest of the Müllerthal-Waldbillig<br />
road, and a log abatis wired with mines<br />
and covered by machine guns w<strong>as</strong><br />
erected to block the valley road south of<br />
Müllerthal. T<strong>as</strong>k Force Chamberlain,<br />
whose tanks had given fire support to<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Luckett, moved during the<br />
afternoon to a backstop position near<br />
Consdorf.<br />
The tank-infantry counterattack by<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Forces Standish and Riley in the<br />
Berdorf and Echternach are<strong>as</strong> also re-<br />
sumed. The enemy resisted w<strong>here</strong>ver en-<br />
countered, but spent most of the daylight<br />
hours regrouping in wooded draws and<br />
hollows and bringing reinforcements<br />
across the river, stepping up his artillery<br />
fire the while. Intense fog shielded all<br />
this activity. Apparently the <strong>as</strong>sembly of<br />
the 316th Regiment behind the 212th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division center w<strong>as</strong><br />
completed during the day. A few rocket<br />
projectors and guns were ferried over at<br />
the civilian ferry site above Echternach,<br />
and about the middle of the afternoon a<br />
bridge w<strong>as</strong> finished at Edingen, w<strong>here</strong><br />
the 320th Regiment had crossed on 16<br />
December. The American counterattack<br />
on the 19th, then, first would be opposed<br />
by infantry and infantry weapons, but<br />
would meet heavier metal and some ar-<br />
mor <strong>as</strong> the day ended.<br />
At Berdorf a team from T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Standish and a platoon of armored en-<br />
gineers set to work mopping up the en-<br />
emy infantry who had holed up in<br />
houses on the north side of the village.<br />
This proved to be slow work. First a<br />
ten-pound pole charge would be ex-<br />
ploded against a wall or house; then a<br />
tank would clank up to the gap and bl<strong>as</strong>t<br />
away; finally the infantry would go to<br />
work with grenades and their shoulder<br />
weapons. At dark the Germans had lost
254 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
a few houses, but were in the process of<br />
being reinforced by Nebelwerfers and<br />
armored vehicles.<br />
Other troops of T<strong>as</strong>k Force Standish<br />
returned to the attack at Hill 329, on the<br />
Berdorf-Echternach road, w<strong>here</strong> they<br />
had been checked by flanking fire the<br />
previous day. Sharp <strong>as</strong>sault destroyed<br />
the German machine gun positions and<br />
the attack reached the ridge leading to<br />
Hill 329. Then the advance had to be<br />
halted short of the objective in order to<br />
free the tanks and half-tracks for use<br />
in evacuating the large number of<br />
wounded. This ambulance convoy w<strong>as</strong><br />
en route to Consdorf, in the late after-<br />
noon, when a radio message reported<br />
that the Germans had cut the road north<br />
of Consdorf and bazooka’d two tanks on<br />
their way back from Berdorf for am-<br />
munition. The wounded were left in<br />
Berdorf and the t<strong>as</strong>k force tanks, ham-<br />
pered by milling civilian refugees, began<br />
a nightlong fire fight with the 2d Bat-<br />
talion, 423d Regiment, which had con-<br />
centrated to capture Consdorf.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Riley sent tanks carrying<br />
infantry into the edge of Echternach on<br />
the morning of 19 December. T<strong>here</strong> they<br />
re-established contact with Company E<br />
and covered the withdrawal of outlying<br />
detachments to the hat factory. The 12th<br />
Infantry commander already had given<br />
permission for Company E to evacuate<br />
Echternach, but communications were<br />
poor–indeed word that the tanks<br />
had reached Company E did not arrive<br />
at the 12th Infantry command post until<br />
four hours after the event–and the relief<br />
force turned back to Lauterborn alone.<br />
The tanks were hardly out of sight be-<br />
fore the Germans began an <strong>as</strong>sault on<br />
the hat factory with bazook<strong>as</strong>, demoli-<br />
tion charges, and an armored <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
gun. Two volunteers were dispatched in<br />
a jeep to make a run for Lauterbarn,<br />
carrying word that enemy tanks were<br />
moving into the city and <strong>as</strong>king for<br />
“help and armor.” The two, l<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
Americans to come out of Echternach,<br />
made the run safely despite direct fire<br />
aimed by the German <strong>as</strong>sault gun. At<br />
Lauterborn, however, they were told<br />
that the tanks could not be risked in<br />
Echternach after dark. American artil-<br />
lery observers by the failing light saw<br />
“troops pouring into Echternach.” Or-<br />
ders were radioed to Company E (a<br />
fresh battery for its radio had been<br />
brought in by the tanks) to fight its way<br />
out during the night. It w<strong>as</strong> too late.<br />
The defenders had been split up by the<br />
German <strong>as</strong>sault and the company com-<br />
mander had to report that he could not<br />
organize a withdrawal. Through the<br />
night of 19–20 December Riley’s tanks<br />
waited on the road just north of Lauter-<br />
born, under orders from the Command-<br />
ing General, CCA, not to attempt a<br />
return through the dark to Echternach.<br />
Although the fighting on 19 December<br />
had been severe on the American left,<br />
a general lull prevailed along the rest of<br />
the line. The enemy made no move to<br />
push deeper in the center. The combat<br />
engineers in Scheidgen returned to Hill<br />
313 and occupied it without a fight. A<br />
few small affrays occurred in the Os-<br />
weiler-Dickweiler sector, but that w<strong>as</strong><br />
all. By nightfall the situation seemed<br />
much improved–despite the incre<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
pressure on the 4th Division companies<br />
closely invested in the north. Both flanks<br />
were nailed down, and the German at-<br />
tack seemed to have lost momentum.<br />
Elsew<strong>here</strong> on the VIII Corps front the<br />
enemy advance w<strong>as</strong> picking up speed<br />
and reinforcements were rolling forward
THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED 255<br />
to widen the avenues of penetration be-<br />
hind the panzers. Reports that two new<br />
German divisions were en route to attack<br />
the 109th Infantry and 9th Armored<br />
Division had reached General Morris,<br />
coming by way of the 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
intelligence agencies. If this additional<br />
weight should be thrown against the thin<br />
American line immediately to the north<br />
of the 4th Infantry Division, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
every likelihood that the line would<br />
break.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> imperative that the line be<br />
held. Troops of the Third <strong>Army</strong> were al-<br />
ready on the move north, t<strong>here</strong> to form<br />
the cutting edge of a powerful thrust in-<br />
to the southern flank of the German<br />
advance. The 109th Infantry, the 9th<br />
Armored Division, the 4th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion, and CCA, 10th Armored Division,<br />
had to win both the time and the space<br />
required for the <strong>as</strong>sembly of the Ameri-<br />
can counterattack forces. General Patton,<br />
commanding the Third <strong>Army</strong>, to which<br />
the VIII Corps w<strong>as</strong> now <strong>as</strong>signed, gave<br />
General Morris a provisional corps on<br />
19 December, composed of the 10th Ar-<br />
mored Division (–) , the 9th Armored,<br />
the 109th Infantry, and the 4th Infantry<br />
Division. Morris, now charged with uni-<br />
fying defensive me<strong>as</strong>ures while the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> counterattack forces gath-<br />
ered behind this cover, alerted CCA,<br />
10th Armored Division, early on the<br />
morning of 20 December, for employ-<br />
ment <strong>as</strong> a mobile reserve. Morris had<br />
already dispatched one of his armored<br />
infantry battalions to help the 9th Ar-<br />
mored in an attack intended to retake<br />
Waldbillig. T<strong>as</strong>k Force Chamberlain<br />
had been placed in reserve the previous<br />
day, but it w<strong>as</strong> not immediately fe<strong>as</strong>ible<br />
to withdraw the two t<strong>as</strong>k forces that<br />
were still engaged alongside the 4th<br />
Division for it would take General Bar-<br />
ton’s division a few hours to reorganize<br />
on a new line and plug the gaps left<br />
by the outgoing armored units.<br />
While General Morris made plans to<br />
hold the ground needed <strong>as</strong> a springboard<br />
for the projected counterattack, General<br />
Beyer, commanding the German LXXX<br />
Corps, prepared to meet an American<br />
riposte. Higher German headquarters<br />
had anticipated the appearance of some<br />
American reinforcements opposite the<br />
LXXX Corps <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> the third day<br />
of the operation. Intervention by ele-<br />
ments of the 10th Armored Division on<br />
18 December, <strong>as</strong> a result, w<strong>as</strong> viewed<br />
only <strong>as</strong> the prelude to a sustained and<br />
forceful American attempt to regain the<br />
initiative. It cannot now be determined<br />
whether the German agents (V-Leute) ,<br />
who undoubtedly were operating be-<br />
hind American lines, had correctly diag-<br />
nosed the beginning of the Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
shift toward Luxembourg and Belgium,<br />
or, if so, whether they had been able to<br />
communicate with the German field<br />
headquarters.<br />
In any event the LXXX Corps com-<br />
mander decided on the night of 19 De-<br />
cember to place his corps on the defen-<br />
sive, his estimate of the situation being<br />
<strong>as</strong> follows. His two divisions generally<br />
had reached the line designated <strong>as</strong> the<br />
LXXX Corps objective. The force avail-<br />
able w<strong>as</strong> insufficient to continue the<br />
attack. On the north flank t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
dangerous and widening gap between<br />
the LXXX Corps and the LXXXV<br />
Corps. The supply situation w<strong>as</strong> poor<br />
and could become critical, in part be-<br />
cause of the Allied air attacks at the<br />
Rhine crossings, in part because of the<br />
Allied success-even during poor flying<br />
weather–in knocking out transportation
256 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
and forward supply dumps in the Trier-<br />
Bitburg area. A large-scale American<br />
counterattack against the LXXX Corps<br />
could be predicted, but lacking aerial<br />
reconnaissance German intelligence<br />
could not expect to determine the time<br />
or strength of such an attack with any<br />
accuracy. General Beyer’s orders for 20<br />
December, t<strong>here</strong>fore, called upon the<br />
212th and 276th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sions to crush the small points of resist-<br />
ance w<strong>here</strong> American troops still con-<br />
tended behind the German main forces,<br />
continue local attacks and counterattacks<br />
in order to secure more favorable<br />
ground for future defense, and close up<br />
along a co-ordinated corps front in prep-<br />
aration for the coming American on-<br />
slaught.<br />
On 20 December t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> savage<br />
fighting in the 4th Infantry Division<br />
zone despite the fact that both of the<br />
combatants were in the process of going<br />
over to the defensive. The 4th Division<br />
and 10th Armored sought to disengage<br />
their advance elements and regroup<br />
along a stronger main line of resistance,<br />
and the enemy fought to dislodge the<br />
American foothold in Berdorf and Ech-<br />
ternach. At the same time elements of<br />
the 276th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
struck through Waldbillig, the point of<br />
contact between the 4th Division and<br />
the 9th Armored, in an attempt to push<br />
the right wing of the LXXX Corps for-<br />
ward to a point w<strong>here</strong> the road net lead-<br />
ing e<strong>as</strong>t to the Sauer might be more<br />
e<strong>as</strong>ily denied the gathering American<br />
forces.<br />
The team from T<strong>as</strong>k Force Standish<br />
had made little progress in its house-to-<br />
house battle in Berdorf. Company F,<br />
12th Infantry, retained its position in<br />
the Parc Hotel, despite a German demo-<br />
lition charge that exploded early in the<br />
morning of the 20th and blew in part of<br />
one wall. After a short melee in the<br />
darkness American hand grenades dis-<br />
couraged the <strong>as</strong>sault at this breach and<br />
the enemy withdrew to a line of foxholes<br />
which had been dug during the night<br />
close to the hotel. When the fight died<br />
down one of the defenders found that<br />
the bl<strong>as</strong>t had opened a sealed annex in<br />
the b<strong>as</strong>ement, the hiding place of several<br />
score bottles of fine liquor and a full<br />
barrel of beer. Lieutenant Leake re-<br />
fused permission to sample this cache, a<br />
decision he would regret when, after<br />
withdrawal from Berdorf, he and<br />
twenty-one of his men were returned to<br />
the foxhole line with neither their coats<br />
nor blankets.<br />
At daylight on 20 December the 1st<br />
Battalion, 423d Regiment, which had<br />
been brought in from the Lauterborn<br />
area, initiated a counterattack against<br />
the team from T<strong>as</strong>k Force Standish at<br />
the edge of Berdorf and recovered all<br />
the ground lost during the previous two<br />
days. The American artillery forward<br />
observer’s tank w<strong>as</strong> crippled by a ba-<br />
zooka and the radio put out of commis-<br />
sion, but eventually word reached the<br />
supporting artillery, which quickly<br />
drove the enemy to cover. Although the<br />
evacuation of Berdorf w<strong>as</strong> part of the<br />
4th Division plan for redressing its line,<br />
the actual withdrawal w<strong>as</strong> none too e<strong>as</strong>y.<br />
The Germans had cut the road back to<br />
Consdorf; so the right team of T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Standish w<strong>as</strong> withdrawn from the<br />
attack on Hill 329 and spent most of the<br />
afternoon clearing an exit for the men<br />
and vehicles in Berdorf. Finally, a little<br />
after dark, Companies B and F (12th<br />
Infantry), ten engineers, and four<br />
squads of armored infantry loaded onto
THE GERMAN SOUTHERN SHOULDER IS JAMMED<br />
eleven tanks and six half-tracks and<br />
made their way p<strong>as</strong>t burning buildings<br />
to the new 4th Division line north and<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Consdorf.<br />
The elements of T<strong>as</strong>k Force Riley,<br />
which had waited outside of Lauterborn<br />
through the night of 19–20 December in<br />
vain expectation that Company E would<br />
attempt to break out of Echternach, re-<br />
ceived a radio message at 0823 that<br />
Company E w<strong>as</strong> surrounded by tanks and<br />
could not get out. Through the morning<br />
rumors and more rumors poured over<br />
the American radio nets, but t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
no sign of Company E. About noon Colo-<br />
nel Riley agreed to send a few tanks in<br />
one final effort to reach the infantry in<br />
Echternach, provided that the 12th In-<br />
fantry would give his tanks some pro-<br />
tection. Company G, t<strong>here</strong>fore, w<strong>as</strong><br />
<strong>as</strong>signed this t<strong>as</strong>k. At 1330 a report<br />
reached the 12th Infantry that Company<br />
E had gotten out. Half an hour later<br />
this report w<strong>as</strong> denied; now a message<br />
said the company w<strong>as</strong> coming out in<br />
small groups. Finally, in the late after-<br />
noon, Colonel Chance sent a call over<br />
the radio relay system: “W<strong>here</strong> is<br />
Riley?” Thirty minutes later the answer<br />
came back from CCA: a section of tanks<br />
and some riflemen were fighting at the<br />
outskirts of Echternach.<br />
This w<strong>as</strong> the l<strong>as</strong>t effort. Night had<br />
come, Echternach w<strong>as</strong> swarming with<br />
Germans, and the 10th Armored Divi-<br />
sion headquarters had ordered all its<br />
teams to re<strong>as</strong>semble behind the 4th<br />
Division lines preparatory to moving “in<br />
any direction.” Since most of T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Riley by this time had reverted to the<br />
reserve, Lauterborn, the b<strong>as</strong>e for opera-<br />
tions against Echternach, w<strong>as</strong> aban-<br />
doned. Company G, now some forty<br />
men, and the l<strong>as</strong>t of Riley’s tanks with-<br />
257<br />
drew to the new main line of resistance.<br />
It is probable that the Americans in<br />
Echternach were forced to surrender<br />
late on 20 December. General Sensfuss<br />
had determined to er<strong>as</strong>e the stubborn<br />
garrison and led the 212th Fusilier Bat-<br />
talion and some <strong>as</strong>sault guns (or tanks)<br />
in person to bl<strong>as</strong>t the Americans loose.<br />
The commander of the 212th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division received a slight<br />
wound but had the satisfaction of taking<br />
the surrender of the troublesome Amer-<br />
icans, about 111 officers and men from<br />
Company E, plus 21 men belonging to<br />
Company H. On this same day the Com-<br />
pany F outpost which had held out at<br />
Birkelt Farm since 16 December capitu-<br />
lated.<br />
Finally the enemy had control of most<br />
of the northern section of the road net<br />
between the Sauer River and Luxem-<br />
bourg-but it w<strong>as</strong> too late. The new<br />
American line, running from Dickweiler<br />
through Osweiler, Hill 313, Consdorf, to<br />
south of Müllerthal, w<strong>as</strong> somewhat weak<br />
in the center but solidly anchored at the<br />
flanks. The German attack through the<br />
9th Armored sector beyond Waldbillig<br />
had been checked. At the opposite end of<br />
the line enemy guns and mortars worked<br />
feverishly to bring down Dickweiler<br />
around the ears of the defenders, but the<br />
Americans could not be shelled out.<br />
(When one bl<strong>as</strong>t threw a commode and<br />
sink from a second story down on the<br />
rear deck of a tank the crew simply com-<br />
plained that no bathing facilities had<br />
been provided.) At Bech, behind the<br />
American center, General Barton now<br />
had the 3d Battalion, 22d Infantry, in<br />
reserve, having further stripped the 4th<br />
Division right. And in and around Eisen-<br />
born, CCA, 10th Armored Division, w<strong>as</strong><br />
<strong>as</strong>sembling to counter any German at-
258 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tack. Barton’s troops and Morris’ tanks<br />
had brought the 212th and the 276th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division to a halt, had<br />
then withdrawn most of their advance<br />
detachments successfully, and now held<br />
a stronger position on a shortened line.<br />
The southern shoulder of the German<br />
counteroffensive had jammed.<br />
Southern Flank–A Summing Up<br />
The Seventh <strong>Army</strong> had thrown three<br />
of its four divisions into the surprise at-<br />
tack at the Sauer River on 16 December.<br />
The Americans had met this onslaught<br />
with two infantry regiments (the 12th<br />
and 109th) , an armored infantry battal-<br />
ion (the 60th), and an understrength<br />
tank battalion (the 70th), these units<br />
and others attached making the total<br />
approximately division strength. The<br />
stubborn and successful defense of<br />
towns and villages close to the Sauer had<br />
blocked the road net, so essential to<br />
movement in this rugged country, and<br />
barred a quick sweep into the American<br />
rear are<strong>as</strong>.<br />
In like manner the enemy had failed<br />
in the quick accomplishment of one of<br />
his major t<strong>as</strong>ks, that is, overrunning the<br />
American artillery positions or at the<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t forcing the guns to withdraw to<br />
positions from which they could no<br />
longer interdict the German bridge sites.<br />
General Barton, it may be added, had<br />
refused absolutely to permit the artillery<br />
to move rearward. The failure to open<br />
the divisional bridges over the Sauer<br />
within the first twenty-four hours had<br />
forced the German infantry to continue<br />
to fight without their accustomed heavy<br />
weapons support even while American<br />
reinforcements were steadily reducing<br />
the numerical edge possessed by the<br />
attacker. Further, the German inability<br />
to meet the American tanks with tanks<br />
or heavy antimechanized means gave the<br />
American rifleman an appreciable moral<br />
superiority (particularly toward the end<br />
of the battle) over his German counter-<br />
part.<br />
It should be added that Seventh <strong>Army</strong><br />
divisions suffered <strong>as</strong> the stepchild of the<br />
Ardennes offensive, not only when<br />
bridge trains failed to arrive or proved<br />
inadequate but also in the niggardly<br />
issue of heavy weapons and artillery<br />
ammunition , particularly chemical<br />
shells. Perhaps these German divisions<br />
faced from the onset the insoluble tacti-<br />
cal dilemma, insoluble at le<strong>as</strong>t if the out-<br />
numbered defenders staunchly held<br />
their ground when cut off and sur-<br />
rounded. Strength sufficient to achieve a<br />
quick, limited penetration the German<br />
divisions possessed, so long <strong>as</strong> the <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
forces did not stop to clean out the vil-<br />
lage centers of resistance. Strength to ex-<br />
ploit these points of penetration failed<br />
when the village centers of resistance<br />
were byp<strong>as</strong>sed.<br />
Successful the American defense in the<br />
Sauer sector had been, but costly too.<br />
In six days (through 21 December, after<br />
which the Americans would begin their<br />
counterattack) the units <strong>here</strong> on the<br />
southern shoulder lost over 2,000 killed,<br />
wounded, or missing. German c<strong>as</strong>ualties<br />
probably ran somewhat higher, but<br />
whether substantially so is questionable.<br />
In any c<strong>as</strong>e, about 800 German prisoners<br />
were taken and nonbattle c<strong>as</strong>ualties must<br />
have been severe, for German com-<br />
manders later reported that the number<br />
of exposure and trench foot c<strong>as</strong>es had<br />
been unusually high, the result of the<br />
village fighting in which the defender<br />
had the greater protection from cold<br />
and damp.
CHAPTER XI<br />
The 1st SS Panzer Division's D<strong>as</strong>h<br />
Westward, and Operation Greif<br />
The bulk of the fourteen divisions<br />
under First U.S. <strong>Army</strong> command on 16<br />
December were deployed north of the<br />
Belgian Ardennes. Behind them, roughly<br />
in the triangle formed by the cities of<br />
Liège, Verviers, and Spa, lay the supply<br />
installations built up through the au-<br />
tumn to support the advance toward the<br />
Rhine. At Spa, which had served the<br />
German Emperor <strong>as</strong> headquarters in<br />
World War I, the First <strong>Army</strong> had estab-<br />
lished its command post surrounded on<br />
every side by service installations, supply<br />
dumps, and depots. Liège, twenty miles<br />
northwest of Spa, w<strong>as</strong> one of the great-<br />
est American supply centers on the Con-<br />
tinent. Verviers, an important and dense-<br />
ly stocked railhead lay eleven miles<br />
north of Spa. (See Map I.)<br />
General Hodges’ First <strong>Army</strong> head-<br />
quarters, set up in the décl<strong>as</strong>sé resort<br />
hotels and c<strong>as</strong>inos of the once f<strong>as</strong>hion-<br />
able watering place, w<strong>as</strong> remote from<br />
sound of battle on the morning of 16<br />
December, but in a matter of hours the<br />
sl<strong>as</strong>hing thrust of the 1st SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sion roughly altered its ordered exist-<br />
ence. The nature of the ground along<br />
which the Americans would attempt to<br />
defend the myriad headquarters and<br />
service installations, railheads, and<br />
depots, must be explained. Southe<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Spa runs the Amblève River, the creation<br />
of a series of tributaries flowing south<br />
from the springs and swamps of the<br />
rugged Hohes Venn. The Amblève,<br />
bending westward, is joined by the Salm,<br />
GENERAL HODGES<br />
a north-flowing tributary, at the town of<br />
Trois Ponts, then angles northwest until<br />
it meets the Ourthe River and finally the<br />
Meuse at Liège. The Amblève and the<br />
Salm are narrow. and rather minor<br />
streams; the valleys through which they<br />
course are deep-cut, with long stretches
260 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
of steep and rocky walls. A line on the<br />
map tracing the course of the Ambèke<br />
River and its initial tributaries will p<strong>as</strong>s<br />
from northe<strong>as</strong>t to southwest through<br />
three important bridgeheads and road<br />
centers, Malmédy, Stavelot, and Trois<br />
Ponts. From the first two, roads led north<br />
to Spa, Verviers, and Liège. Although<br />
both Malmédy and Stavelot were admin-<br />
istrative centers of importance (Stavelot<br />
contained the First <strong>Army</strong> map depot<br />
with some 2,500,000 maps), the most<br />
important item <strong>here</strong>abouts w<strong>as</strong> the great<br />
store of g<strong>as</strong>oline, over two million gal-<br />
lons, in dumps just north of the two<br />
towns.<br />
The 1st SS Panzer Division (SS Ober-<br />
fuehrer Wilhelm Mohnke) w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
strongest fighting unit in the Sixth Pan-<br />
zer <strong>Army</strong>. Undiluted by any large influx<br />
of untrained Luftwaffe or Navy replace-<br />
ments, possessed of most of its T / O&E<br />
equipment, it had an available armored<br />
strength on 16 December of about a<br />
hundred tanks, equally divided between<br />
the Mark IV and the Panther, plus forty-<br />
two Tiger tanks belonging to the 501st<br />
SS Panzer Detachment. The road net in<br />
the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> would not per-<br />
mit the commitment of the 1st SS Pan-<br />
zer <strong>as</strong> a division, even if two of the five<br />
roads allocated the army were employed.<br />
The division w<strong>as</strong> t<strong>here</strong>fore divided into<br />
four columns or march groups: the first,<br />
commanded by Colonel Peiper, con-<br />
tained the bulk of the 1st Panzer Regi-<br />
ment and thus represented the armored<br />
spearhead of the division; the second w<strong>as</strong><br />
made up from the division’s Reconnais-<br />
sance Battalion; the third and fourth<br />
each comprised armored infantry and<br />
attached heavy weapons; the heavy Ti-<br />
ger detachment w<strong>as</strong> left to be fed into<br />
the advance <strong>as</strong> occ<strong>as</strong>ion warranted.<br />
Kampfgrupfe Peiper on the Move<br />
On the morning of 16 December Colo-<br />
nel Peiper journeyed to the advance<br />
command post of the 12th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division, whose troops were sup-<br />
posed to make the gap in the lines of<br />
the American 99th Infantry Division<br />
north of the Schnee Eifel through which<br />
his armor would be committed. 1 <strong>To</strong><br />
Peiper’s disgust the infantry failed in<br />
their <strong>as</strong>signed t<strong>as</strong>k and the day wore on<br />
with Peiper’s column still waiting on the<br />
roads to the rear. The blown bridge<br />
northwest of Losheim incre<strong>as</strong>ed the de-<br />
lay; for some re<strong>as</strong>on the engineers failed<br />
to start repair work <strong>here</strong> until noon or<br />
later. This w<strong>as</strong> not the end. In midafter-<br />
noon the horse-drawn artillery regiment<br />
of the 12th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> ordered up to support the infantry,<br />
hopelessly clogging the approaches to<br />
the bridge. Peiper himself took over the<br />
job of trying to straighten out this traffic<br />
jam but more time w<strong>as</strong> lost. It w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
until 1930 that the armored advance<br />
guard w<strong>as</strong> able to reach Losheim, the<br />
village which gave its name to the gap<br />
at the northern terminus of the Schnee<br />
Eifel. At this time Peiper received a<br />
radio message saying that the next rail-<br />
road overp<strong>as</strong>s w<strong>as</strong> out, that the engineers<br />
would not get up in time to make repairs,<br />
and that he must turn west to Lanzerath<br />
2 The records of Peiper’s unit were destroyed<br />
just before his capture. In 1945, however, Peiper<br />
w<strong>as</strong> interviewed by members of the ETO His-<br />
torical Section. (See Ferriss, Rpt B<strong>as</strong>ed on Intervs<br />
in January 1945. p<strong>as</strong>sim.) Much of the tactical<br />
detail used <strong>here</strong>in comes from the 3,268-page<br />
trial transcript of the so-called Malmédy C<strong>as</strong>e<br />
tried before the U.S. General <strong>Military</strong> Government<br />
Court in 1946. A good summary of the latter is<br />
found in a manuscript by Royce L. Thompson<br />
entitled The ETO Ardennes Campaign: Opera-<br />
tions of the Combat Group Peiper, 16–26 December<br />
1944 (1952), in OCMH files.
THE ENEMY DASH WESTWARD AND OPERATION GREIF 261<br />
in the 3d Parachute Division sector.<br />
This move w<strong>as</strong> completed by midnight,<br />
although a number of tanks and other<br />
vehicles were lost to mines and anti-<br />
tank fire while making the turnabout at<br />
Losheim. At Lanzerath Colonel Peiper<br />
discovered that the 3d Parachute also had<br />
failed to punch any sizable hole through<br />
the American line, although the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division had taken Krewinkel<br />
and so helped the 3d Parachute forward.<br />
Irritated by the hours frittered away,<br />
Peiper took an infantry battalion, put<br />
two of his Panther tanks at the point of<br />
the column, and at 0400 attacked toward<br />
Honsfeld. Opposition had evaporated.<br />
Honsfeld w<strong>as</strong> surprised and taken with<br />
e<strong>as</strong>e. 2<br />
The original route <strong>as</strong>signed Peiper’s<br />
kampfgruppe ran west to Schoppen. This<br />
w<strong>as</strong> a poor road, bogged with mud from<br />
the winter rains, and since the 12th SS<br />
Panzer Division had not yet come up<br />
Peiper pre-empted the latter’s paved<br />
route through Büllingen. Also he had<br />
been told that t<strong>here</strong> were g<strong>as</strong>oline stores<br />
in Büllingen, and a great deal of fuel<br />
had been burned during the jockeying<br />
around Losheim. Sure enough, the g<strong>as</strong>o-<br />
line w<strong>as</strong> found <strong>as</strong> predicted. Using<br />
American prisoners <strong>as</strong> labor, the Ger-<br />
mans refueled their tanks. They scooped<br />
up much other booty <strong>here</strong> and destroyed<br />
a number of artillery planes on a near-<br />
by field. When American gunners com-<br />
menced to shell the village the<br />
column w<strong>as</strong> already moving on, although<br />
it suffered some c<strong>as</strong>ualties. By this time<br />
Peiper and his staff believed that the<br />
breakthrough w<strong>as</strong> complete; no Amer-<br />
ican troops appeared on the sensitive<br />
north flank, and only an occ<strong>as</strong>ional jeep<br />
scuttled away to the west of the column.<br />
2 Ch. VIII.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> between noon and one o’clock<br />
of 17 December, on the road between<br />
Modersheid and Ligneuville, that the<br />
German advance guard ran into an<br />
American truck convoy moving south<br />
from Malmédy. This w<strong>as</strong> ill-fated Bat-<br />
tery B of the 285th Field Artillery Ob-<br />
servation Battalion. The convoy w<strong>as</strong> shot<br />
up and the advance guard rolled on,<br />
leaving the troops to the rear to deal<br />
with the Americans who had taken to<br />
the woods and ditches. About two hours<br />
after, or so the dazed survivors later re-<br />
called, the Americans who had been<br />
rounded up were marched into a field<br />
w<strong>here</strong>, at a signal, they were shot down<br />
by machine gun and pistol fire. A few<br />
escaped by feigning death, but the<br />
wounded who moved or screamed were<br />
sought out and shot through the head.<br />
At le<strong>as</strong>t eighty-six Americans were m<strong>as</strong>-<br />
sacred <strong>here</strong>. This w<strong>as</strong> not the first killing<br />
of unarmed prisoners chargeable to<br />
Kampfgruppe Peiper on 17 December.<br />
Irrefutable evidence shows that nineteen<br />
unarmed Americans were shot down at<br />
Honsfeld and fifty at Büllingen. 3<br />
The Malmédy m<strong>as</strong>sacre would have<br />
repercussions reaching far wider than<br />
one might expect of a single battlefield<br />
atrocity in a long and bitter war. This<br />
“incident” undoubtedly stiffened the<br />
will of the American combatants (al-<br />
though a quantitative <strong>as</strong>sessment of this<br />
fact is impossible) ; it would be featured<br />
in the war crimes trials <strong>as</strong> an outstanding<br />
3 The m<strong>as</strong>sacres perpetrated by Peiper’s troops<br />
were the subject of a special Congressional in-<br />
vestigation: 81st Cong., 1st sess., Report of the<br />
Subcommittee on Armed Services, United States<br />
Senate, Malmédy M<strong>as</strong>sacre Investigation (dated 13<br />
October 1949). 3 Records of the War Crimes<br />
Branch, <strong>US</strong>FET, 1946. The postwar SS view of<br />
the Malmédy incident is given in Paul Hausser’s<br />
Waflen–SS im Einsatz (Goettingen, 1953), pp.<br />
242–57.
262<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
PEIPER’S TROOPS ON THE ROAD TO MALMÉDY<br />
example of Nazi contempt for the ac-<br />
cepted rules of war; and it would serve<br />
a United States Senator <strong>as</strong> a stepping-<br />
stone toward a meteoric career. But the<br />
Malmédy m<strong>as</strong>sacre and the other mur-<br />
ders of 17 December did not complete<br />
the list chargeable to Peiper and the<br />
troops of the 1st SS Panzer Division. By<br />
20 December Peiper’s command had<br />
murdered approximately 350 American<br />
prisoners of war and at le<strong>as</strong>t 100 un-<br />
armed Belgian civilians, this total de-<br />
rived from killings at twelve different<br />
locations along Peiper’s line of march.<br />
So far <strong>as</strong> can be determined the Peiper<br />
killings represent the only organized and<br />
directed murder of prisoners of war by<br />
either side during the Ardennes battle. 4<br />
The commander of the Sixth SS Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> took oath in the trials of 1946 that,<br />
acting on Hitler’s orders, he issued a<br />
directive stating that the German troops<br />
should be preceded “by a wave of terror<br />
and fright and that no human inhibi-<br />
tions should be shown.” T<strong>here</strong> is con-<br />
flicting testimony <strong>as</strong> to whether the or-<br />
ders finally reaching Peiper specifically<br />
enjoined the shooting of prisoners.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is no question, however, that<br />
4 Hitler’s order to take no prisoners probably<br />
had wide circulation. Lt. Col. George Mabry,<br />
commander of the 2d Battalion, 8th Infantry, h<strong>as</strong><br />
stated that his unit captured a German colonel<br />
from the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> who had such an order.<br />
Ltr, Gen Barton to author, 17 Nov 59.
THE ENEMY DASH WESTWARD AND OPERATION GREIF 263<br />
MASSACRED AMERICAN SOLDIERS NEAR MALMÉDY<br />
some of Peiper’s subordinates accepted<br />
the killing of prisoners <strong>as</strong> a command<br />
and that on at le<strong>as</strong>t one occ<strong>as</strong>ion Peiper<br />
himself gave such an order. Why Peiper’s<br />
command gained the bestial distinction<br />
of being the only unit to kill prisoners in<br />
the course of the Ardennes is a subject<br />
of surmise. Peiper had been an adjutant<br />
to Heinrich Himmler and <strong>as</strong> a battalion<br />
commander in Russia is alleged to have<br />
burned two villages and killed all the<br />
inhabitants. The veteran SS troops he<br />
led in the Ardennes had long experience<br />
on the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front w<strong>here</strong> brutality<br />
toward prisoners of war w<strong>as</strong> a common-<br />
place. On the other hand Peiper’s for-<br />
mation w<strong>as</strong> well in the van of the Ger-<br />
man attack and w<strong>as</strong> thus in position to<br />
carry out the orders for the “wave of<br />
terror” tactic—which might be excused,<br />
or so Peiper claimed, by the rapid move-<br />
ment of his kampfgruppe and its in-<br />
ability to retain prisoners under guard.<br />
The speed with which the news of the<br />
Malmédy m<strong>as</strong>sacre reached the Ameri-<br />
can front-line troops is amazing but, in<br />
the perfervid emotional climate of 17<br />
December, quite understandable. The<br />
first survivors of the m<strong>as</strong>sacre were<br />
picked up by a patrol from the 291st<br />
Engineer Combat Battalion about 1430<br />
on that date. The inspector general of
264 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the First <strong>Army</strong> learned of the shootings<br />
three or four hours later. Yet by the late<br />
evening of the 17th the rumor that the<br />
enemy w<strong>as</strong> killing prisoners had reached<br />
<strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the forward American divisions.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> were American commanders who<br />
orally expressed the opinion that all SS<br />
troops should be killed on sight and<br />
t<strong>here</strong> is some indication that in isolated<br />
c<strong>as</strong>es express orders for this were given. 5<br />
It is probable that Germans who at-<br />
tempted to surrender in the days imme-<br />
diately after the 17th ran a greater risk<br />
than would have been the c<strong>as</strong>e during<br />
the autumn campaign. T<strong>here</strong> is no evi-<br />
dence, however, that American troops<br />
took advantage of orders, implicit or ex-<br />
plicit, to kill their SS prisoners.<br />
The point of Peiper’s column reached<br />
Ligneuville sometime before 1300, in<br />
time to eat the lunch which had been<br />
prepared for an American detachment<br />
stationed in the village. Here the road<br />
divided, the north fork going to Mal-<br />
médy, the western leading on to Stavelot.<br />
Although it w<strong>as</strong> agreed that the armored<br />
columns should have considerable lee-<br />
way in choosing the exact routes they<br />
would follow, a general boundary line<br />
gave the 1st SS Panzer Division the<br />
southern part of the zone <strong>as</strong>signed the<br />
I SS Panzer, while the 12th SS Panzer<br />
Division advanced in the northern sector.<br />
The 12th SS Panzer Division, of course,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> still back at the line of scrimmage,<br />
nor would it break into the clear for<br />
many hours to come, but all this w<strong>as</strong> un-<br />
known to Peiper. He did know that the<br />
5 Thus Fragmentary Order 27, issued by Head-<br />
quarters, 328th Infantry, on 21 December for the<br />
attack scheduled the following day says: “No SS<br />
troops or paratroopers will be taken prisoners but<br />
will be shot on sight.”<br />
Americans thus far had shown no disposi-<br />
tion to throw punches at his north flank.<br />
Furthermore, the 3d Parachute Division<br />
had a clear field to follow up and protect<br />
his line of communications, while the 2d<br />
Panzer Division-so Peiper understood-<br />
w<strong>as</strong> moving f<strong>as</strong>t in the south and roughly<br />
abre<strong>as</strong>t of his own advance.<br />
Peiper had a precisely defined mis-<br />
sion: his kampfgruppe w<strong>as</strong> to seize the<br />
Meuse River crossings at Huy, making<br />
full use of the element of surprise and<br />
driving west without regard to any flank<br />
protection. The importance of this mis-<br />
sion had been underlined during the<br />
initial briefing at the command post of<br />
the 1st SS Panzer Division on 14 Decem-<br />
ber when Peiper had been <strong>as</strong>sured that<br />
his command would play the decisive<br />
role in the coming counteroffensive.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> seems to have been some hope ex-<br />
pressed among the higher German staffs<br />
that the advance guard elements of both<br />
the 1st SS Panzer Division and the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong>’s 2d Panzer Division would<br />
reach the Meuse within twenty-four<br />
hours of the time of commitment. The<br />
distance by road, on the 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division axis, w<strong>as</strong> between 125 and 150<br />
kilometers (about 75 to 95 miles). Pei-<br />
per himself had made a test run on 11<br />
December to prove that it w<strong>as</strong> possible<br />
for single tanks to travel 80 kilometers<br />
(50 miles) in one night. Whether an<br />
entire tank column could maintain this<br />
rate of progress for a day and a night<br />
in enemy country and on the sharp turns<br />
and grades of the Ardennes road net w<strong>as</strong><br />
a matter of guesswork. 6<br />
Whatever schedule Peiper w<strong>as</strong> using,<br />
6 Peiper later said that if the German infantry<br />
had made a penetration by 0700 on 16 December<br />
he could have reached the Meuse the same day.
THE ENEMY DASH WESTWARD AND OPERATION GREIF 265<br />
if indeed he had any precise timetable<br />
in mind, the kampfgruppe of the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong> making good prog-<br />
ress and the element of surprise, <strong>as</strong><br />
shown by the lack of any formal resist-<br />
ance, w<strong>as</strong> working to German advantage.<br />
His path lay straight ahead, through<br />
Stavelot, Trois Ponts, Werbomont, Ouf-<br />
fet, Seny, Huy–a distance of some 50<br />
miles, from w<strong>here</strong> the head of the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division column stood in Ligneu-<br />
ville, to Huy and the Meuse. Only<br />
a few short miles to the north lay Mal-<br />
médy and the road to Spa and Liège.<br />
Malmédy and the Meuse crossing sites in<br />
the vicinity of Liège, however, were in<br />
the zone <strong>as</strong>signed the 12th SS Panzer<br />
Division. Peiper stuck to his knitting.<br />
About 1400 the column resumed the<br />
march, taking some time to negotiate the<br />
sharp turns and narrow streets in Ligneu-<br />
ville. At the western exit the point<br />
of the column ran onto the trains be-<br />
longing to CCB, 9th Armored Division,<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> preparing to move e<strong>as</strong>t in sup-<br />
port of the combat command then en-<br />
gaged in the St. Vith sector. A couple of<br />
Sherman tanks and a tank destroyer<br />
made a fight for it, demolishing the<br />
leading Panther and a few other armored<br />
vehicles. Peiper’s column w<strong>as</strong> delayed for<br />
about an hour.<br />
Advancing along the south bank of the<br />
Amblève, the advance guard reached<br />
Stavelot, the point w<strong>here</strong> the river must<br />
be crossed, at dusk. Looking down on the<br />
town the Germans saw hundreds of<br />
trucks, while on the opposite bank the<br />
road from Stavelot to Malmédy w<strong>as</strong><br />
jammed with vehicles. Although the<br />
Germans did not know it, many of these<br />
trucks were moving to help evacuate the<br />
great First <strong>Army</strong> g<strong>as</strong>oline dumps north<br />
of Stavelot and Malmédy. March serials<br />
of the 7th Armored Division also were<br />
moving through Stavelot en route to<br />
Vielsalm.<br />
The small town of Stavelot (popula-<br />
tion 5,000) lies in the Amblève River<br />
valley surrounded by high, sparsely<br />
wooded bluffs. Most of the town is built<br />
on the north bank of the river or on the<br />
slopes above. T<strong>here</strong> are a few scattered<br />
buildings on the south bank. Like most<br />
of the water courses in this part of the<br />
Ardennes, the Amblève w<strong>as</strong> no particular<br />
obstacle to infantry but the deeply in-<br />
cised valley at this point offered hard<br />
going to tanks, while the river, by re<strong>as</strong>on<br />
of the difficult approaches, w<strong>as</strong> a tougher<br />
than average tank barrier. Only one<br />
vehicular bridge spanned the river at<br />
Stavelot. The sole approach to this<br />
bridge w<strong>as</strong> by the main highway; <strong>here</strong><br />
the ground to the left fell away sharply<br />
and to the right a steep bank rose above<br />
the road.<br />
Stavelot and its bridge were open for<br />
the taking. The only combat troops in<br />
the town at this time were a squad from<br />
the 291st Engineer Combat Battalion<br />
which had been sent from Malmédy to<br />
construct a roadblock on the road lead-<br />
ing to the bridge. For some re<strong>as</strong>on Pei-<br />
per’s advance guard halted on the south<br />
side of the river, one of those quirks in<br />
the conduct of military operations which<br />
have critical import but which can never<br />
be explained. Months after the event<br />
Peiper told interrogators that his force<br />
had been checked by American antitank<br />
weapons covering the narrow approach<br />
to the bridge, that Stavelot w<strong>as</strong> “heavily<br />
defended.” But his detailed description<br />
of what happened when the Germans<br />
attacked to take town and bridge shows<br />
that he w<strong>as</strong> confused in his chronology<br />
and w<strong>as</strong> thinking of events which tran-
266<br />
spired on 18 December. It is true that<br />
during the early evening of the 17th<br />
three German tanks made a rush for the<br />
bridge, but when the leader hit a h<strong>as</strong>ty<br />
mine field, laid by American engineers,<br />
the others turned back–nor were they<br />
seen for the rest of the night.<br />
Perhaps the sight of the numerous<br />
American vehicles parked in the streets<br />
led Peiper to believe that the town w<strong>as</strong><br />
held in force and that a night attack<br />
held the only chance of taking the bridge<br />
intact. If so, the single effort made by<br />
the German point is out of keeping with<br />
Peiper’s usual ruthless drive and daring.<br />
Perhaps Peiper accepted the word of his<br />
leading troops and failed to establish the<br />
true situation for himself. Perhaps he<br />
w<strong>as</strong> interested at this moment only in<br />
closing up his third column, which in<br />
march formation extended for fifteen<br />
miles. Perhaps, <strong>as</strong> he says, Peiper w<strong>as</strong><br />
waiting for his infantry. Whatever the<br />
re<strong>as</strong>on–and it never will be known–the<br />
German kampfgruppe came to a halt on<br />
the night of 17–18 December at the<br />
Stavelot bridge, forty-two miles from the<br />
Meuse.<br />
During the night the First <strong>Army</strong> fed<br />
reinforcements into Malmédy, for it<br />
seemed impossible that the Germans<br />
could forfeit the opportunity to seize the<br />
town. As part of the defense being or-<br />
ganized <strong>here</strong> a company of the 526th<br />
Armored Infantry Battalion and a pla-<br />
toon of 3-inch towed tank destroyers<br />
were ordered to outpost Stavelot. Maj.<br />
Paul J. Solis, commanding this detach-<br />
ment, began moving his troops into posi-<br />
tion just before daybreak: two platoons<br />
on the south bank of the river (with a<br />
section of tank destroyers at the old road-<br />
block) ; one platoon with three 57-mm.<br />
antitank guns and the second section of<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tank destroyers in reserve around the<br />
town square north of the river.<br />
Before the riflemen could organize a<br />
defense the German infantry attacked,<br />
captured the tank destroyers south of the<br />
river, and drove the two platoons back<br />
across the bridge. Taken by surprise, the<br />
Americans failed to destroy the bridge<br />
structure, and a Panther made a d<strong>as</strong>h<br />
about 0800 which carried it onto the<br />
north bank. More tanks followed. For<br />
some while the Germans were held in<br />
the houses next to the river; an antiair-<br />
craft artillery battery from the 7th Ar-<br />
mored Division wandered into the fire<br />
fight and did considerable damage be-<br />
fore it went on its way. A company from<br />
the 202d Engineer Combat Battalion<br />
entered the town and joined in the fray.<br />
By the end of the morning, however, the<br />
German firing line had been built up to<br />
the point w<strong>here</strong> the Americans could no<br />
longer hold inside the village proper,<br />
particularly since the hostile tanks were<br />
roving at will in the streets.<br />
Solis ordered his detachment to retire<br />
to the top of the hill above Stavelot, but<br />
in the confusion of disengagement the<br />
remaining antitank weapons and all but<br />
one of the rifle platoons fell back along<br />
the Malmédy road. With German tanks<br />
climbing behind the lone platoon and<br />
without any means of antitank defense,<br />
Solis seized some of the g<strong>as</strong>oline from the<br />
Francorchamps dump, had his men pour<br />
it out in a deep road cut, w<strong>here</strong> t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> no turn-out, and set it ablaze. The<br />
result w<strong>as</strong> a perfect antitank barrier.<br />
The German tanks turned back to<br />
Stavelot–this w<strong>as</strong> the closest that Kampf-<br />
gruppe Peiper ever came to the great<br />
stores of g<strong>as</strong>oline which might have<br />
taken the 1st SS Panzer Division to the<br />
Meuse River. Solis had burned 124,000
THE ENEMY DASH WESTWARD AND OPERATION GREIF 267<br />
gallons for his improvised roadblock, but<br />
this w<strong>as</strong> the only part of the First <strong>Army</strong>’s<br />
POL reserve lost during the entire Ar-<br />
dennes operation.<br />
While the engagement in Stavelot w<strong>as</strong><br />
still in progress, Peiper turned some of<br />
his tanks toward Trois Ponts, the im-<br />
portant bridgehead at the confluence of<br />
the Salm and the Amblève. As Peiper<br />
puts it: “We proceeded at top speed<br />
towards Trois Ponts in an effort to seize<br />
the bridge t<strong>here</strong>. . . . If we had cap-<br />
tured the bridge at Trois Ponts intact<br />
and had had enough fuel, it would have<br />
been a simple matter to drive through<br />
to the Meuse River early that day.” One<br />
company of Mark IV tanks tried to reach<br />
Trois Ponts by following a narrow side<br />
road on the near bank of the Amblève.<br />
The road w<strong>as</strong> almost imp<strong>as</strong>sable, and<br />
when the column came under American<br />
fire this approach w<strong>as</strong> abandoned. The<br />
main part of the kampfgruppe swung<br />
through Stavelot and advanced on Trois<br />
Ponts by the highway which followed the<br />
north bank of the river. Things were<br />
looking up and it seemed that the only<br />
cause for worry w<strong>as</strong> the lowering level in<br />
the panzer fuel tanks. Missing in Peiper’s<br />
calculations w<strong>as</strong> an American gun, the<br />
puny 57-mm. antitank weapon which<br />
had proven such an impuissant answer to<br />
German tanks.<br />
Trois Ponts gains its name from three<br />
highway bridges, two over the Salm and<br />
one across the Amblève. The road from<br />
Stavelot p<strong>as</strong>ses under railroad tracks <strong>as</strong><br />
it nears Trois Ponts, then veers sharply<br />
to the south, crosses the Amblève, con-<br />
tinues through the narrow valley for a<br />
few hundred yards, and finally turns<br />
west at right angles to cross the Salm and<br />
enter the main section of the small vil-<br />
lage. A number of roads find their way<br />
through the deep recesses of the Salm<br />
and Amblève valleys to reach Trois<br />
Ponts, hidden among the cliffs and hills.<br />
Most, however, wind for some distance<br />
through the gorges and along the tor-<br />
tuous valley floors. One road, a con-<br />
tinuation of the paved highway from<br />
Stavelot, leads immediately from Trois<br />
Ponts and the valley to the west. This<br />
road, via Werbomont, w<strong>as</strong> Peiper’s ob-<br />
jective.<br />
Company C, 51st Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion, occupied Trois Ponts, so im-<br />
portant in the itinerary of the kampf-<br />
gruppe. Quite unaware of the impor-<br />
tance of its mission, the company had<br />
been ordered out of the sawmills it had<br />
been operating <strong>as</strong> part of the First<br />
<strong>Army</strong>’s Winterization and Bridge Tim-<br />
ber Cutting Program, and dispatched<br />
to Trois Ponts w<strong>here</strong> it detrucked<br />
about midnight on 17 December. Num-<br />
bering around 140 men, the company<br />
w<strong>as</strong> armed with eight bazook<strong>as</strong> and ten<br />
machine guns. Maj. Robert B. Yates,<br />
commanding the force, knew only that<br />
the 1111th Engineer Group w<strong>as</strong> prepar-<br />
ing a barrier line along the Salm River<br />
from Trois Ponts south to Bovigny and<br />
that he w<strong>as</strong> to construct roadblocks at<br />
the approaches to Trois Ponts according<br />
to the group plans. During the night<br />
Yates deployed the company at road-<br />
blocks covering the bridge across the<br />
Amblève and at the vulnerable highway<br />
underp<strong>as</strong>s at the railroad tracks north of<br />
the river. On the morning of 18 Decem-<br />
ber a part of the artillery column of the<br />
7th Armored Division p<strong>as</strong>sed through<br />
Trois Ponts, after a detour to avoid the<br />
German armor south of Malmédy; then<br />
appeared one 57-mm. antitank gun and<br />
crew which had become lost during the<br />
move of the 526th Armored Infantry
268<br />
Battalion. Yates commandeered the crew<br />
and placed the gun on the Stavelot road<br />
to the e<strong>as</strong>t of the first underp<strong>as</strong>s w<strong>here</strong><br />
a daisy chain of mines had been laid.<br />
A quarter of an hour before noon the<br />
advance guard of Peiper’s main column,<br />
nineteen or twenty tanks, came rolling<br />
along the road. A shot from the lone<br />
antitank gun crippled or in somewise<br />
stopped the foremost German tank, but<br />
after a brief skirmish the enemy knocked<br />
out the gun, killed four of the crew, and<br />
drove back the engineers. The hit on<br />
the lead tank checked the German column<br />
just long enough to give warning<br />
to the bridge guards, only a few score<br />
yards farther on. They blew the Amblève<br />
bridge, then the Salm bridge, and<br />
fell back to the houses in the main part<br />
of town. In the meantime one of the<br />
engineer platoons had discouraged the<br />
German tank company from further<br />
advance along the side road and it had<br />
turned back to Stavelot 7 .<br />
Frustrated by a battalion antitank gun<br />
and a handful of engineers, Kampf-<br />
gruppe Peiper now had no quick exit<br />
from the valley of the Amblève. With<br />
but one avenue remaining the column<br />
turned northward toward La Gleize,<br />
moving through the canyons of the Am-<br />
blève on the e<strong>as</strong>t side of the river. At<br />
La Gleize t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a western exit from<br />
the valley, although by a mediocre,<br />
twisting road. Nearby, at the hamlet of<br />
Cheneux, the Germans found a bridge<br />
intact over the Amblève. This stroke of<br />
good luck w<strong>as</strong> countered by bad when<br />
the weather cleared and American fight-<br />
er-bombers knocked out two or three<br />
7 The ubiquitous 51st Engineer Combat Bat-<br />
talion will crop up at many points in this narra-<br />
tive. The battalion w<strong>as</strong> awarded a Presidential<br />
Citation.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tanks and seven half-tracks, blocking the<br />
narrow road for a considerable period.<br />
When night came the armored point w<strong>as</strong><br />
within some three miles of Werbomont,<br />
an important road center on the main<br />
highway linking Liège and B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Then, <strong>as</strong> the Germans neared a creek<br />
(the Lienne) a squad of Company A,<br />
291st Engineer Combat Battalion, blew<br />
up the only bridge. Reconnaissance<br />
north and south discovered other<br />
bridges, but all were too fragile to sup-<br />
port the Tiger tanks which had come<br />
forward with the advance guard. Dur-<br />
ing the evening one detachment with<br />
half-tracks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns did cross on<br />
a bridge to the north and swung south-<br />
west toward Werbomont. Near Chevron<br />
this force ran into an ambush, set by a<br />
battalion of the 30th Division which had<br />
been sent to head off Peiper, and w<strong>as</strong> cut<br />
to pieces. Few of the Germans escaped.<br />
Since t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> nothing left but to dou-<br />
ble back on his tracks, Peiper left a<br />
guard on the bridge at Cheneux and<br />
moved his advance guard through the<br />
dark toward the town of Stoumont, situ-<br />
ated on the Amblève River road from<br />
which the abortive detour had been<br />
made during the afternoon. Scouts<br />
brought in word that Stoumont w<strong>as</strong><br />
strongly held and that more American<br />
troops were moving in from Spa. T<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> nothing left but to fight for the town.<br />
All through the afternoon of the<br />
18th, liaison planes from the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
airstrip at Spa had been skidding under<br />
the clouds to take a look at Peiper’s<br />
tanks and half-tracks. One of these light<br />
planes picked up the advance at Cheneux<br />
and called the Ninth Air Force in to<br />
work over this force. By the evening of<br />
18 December Peiper’s entire column,<br />
now spread over many miles of road,
THE ENEMY DASH WESTWARD AND OPERATION GREIF 269<br />
had been located and the word fl<strong>as</strong>hed<br />
back to First <strong>Army</strong> headquarters. The<br />
element of surprise, vital to the German<br />
plan of a coup .de main at the Meuse,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> gone. American forces from the 30th<br />
Infantry Division were racing in on<br />
Peiper from the north, and the 82d Air-<br />
borne Division w<strong>as</strong> moving with all pos-<br />
sible speed to the threatened area.<br />
It is doubtful that Peiper realized how<br />
the American net w<strong>as</strong> being spread for<br />
a c<strong>as</strong>t from the north, but he had<br />
experienced enough reverses on 18 De-<br />
cember to feel the stiffening of opposi-<br />
tion in his path. Radio contact between<br />
Peiper and the higher German head-<br />
quarters had broken down, the armored<br />
sending apparatus failing to carry over<br />
the Ardennes terrain, and the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> forced to follow<br />
Peiper’s progress through intercepted<br />
American radio messages. Peiper, on<br />
the other hand, had little or no in-<br />
formation <strong>as</strong> to what w<strong>as</strong> happening be-<br />
hind him and w<strong>here</strong> the following<br />
kampfgruppen of his own division were<br />
located. A Luftwaffe ultrahigh-fre-<br />
quency radio set w<strong>as</strong> rushed to Peiper<br />
by liaison officer late this day, but its<br />
possession did not alter the relative<br />
independence and isolation of Peiper’s<br />
command.<br />
Sometime during the night of 18–<br />
19 December the radio link with the<br />
headquarters of the 1st Panzer Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> restored. By this means Peiper may<br />
have learned what he already must<br />
have suspected, that the 30th Infantry<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> on the move south from<br />
the American Ninth <strong>Army</strong> sector. Ger-<br />
man reconnaissance and intelligence<br />
agencies opposite the U.S. Ninth <strong>Army</strong><br />
had been alert from the first hours of<br />
the counteroffensive for any sign that<br />
troops were being stripped from the<br />
Roer front for intervention in the south.<br />
The first two divisions to leave the Ninth<br />
<strong>Army</strong> area, the 30th Infantry and 7th<br />
Armored, actually were in reserve and<br />
out of contact, but when the two started<br />
moving on 17 December the word w<strong>as</strong><br />
fl<strong>as</strong>hed back to OB WEST almost at<br />
once. Again American radio security had<br />
failed.<br />
Operation Greif<br />
During the l<strong>as</strong>t days before the great<br />
offensive which would send the German<br />
armored spearheads plunging west,<br />
Hitler belatedly set about replicating<br />
the winning combination of rapid and<br />
deep armored penetration, paratroop<br />
attacks in the enemy rear, and in-<br />
filtration by disguised ground troops<br />
which had functioned so effectively in<br />
the western campaign of 1940 and the<br />
Greek campaign of 1941. <strong>To</strong> flesh out<br />
this combination, a special operation<br />
named Greif (or Condor) w<strong>as</strong> hurriedly<br />
organized <strong>as</strong> an adjunct to the armored<br />
operation <strong>as</strong>signed the 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division. 8<br />
The plans for the ground ph<strong>as</strong>e of<br />
Greif consisted of three parts: the seizure<br />
intact of at le<strong>as</strong>t two bridges across the<br />
Meuse by disguised raiding parties, the<br />
prompt reinforcement of any such coup<br />
de main by an armored commando for-<br />
mation; and an organized attempt to<br />
create confusion in the Allied rear are<strong>as</strong><br />
through sabotage carried out by jeep<br />
parties clad in American uniforms. Later<br />
it would be rumored that a feature of<br />
8 The origins of this scheme are described by<br />
Manteuffel in Frieden and Richardson, eds., The<br />
Fatal Decisions, pp 272–74. See also B. H. Liddell<br />
Hart, The Other Side of the Hill (London:<br />
C<strong>as</strong>sell and Company, Ltd., 1951).
270 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Operation Greif w<strong>as</strong> the planned <strong>as</strong>s<strong>as</strong>sination<br />
of Allied leaders, notably<br />
General Eisenhower, but t<strong>here</strong> is no<br />
evidence of such plotting in the plan.<br />
The idea for the ground operation<br />
w<strong>as</strong> probably Hitler’s and the leader,<br />
Lt. Col. Otto Skorzeny, w<strong>as</strong> selected personally<br />
by Hitler. Skorzeny had achieved<br />
a considerable reputation <strong>as</strong> a daring<br />
commando leader, had rescued Mussolini<br />
from the Italians, and had seized<br />
the Hungarian Regent, Admiral Miklós<br />
von Nagybánya Horthy, when the Hungarian<br />
regime began to waver in its<br />
loyalties. For Operation Greif, Skorzeny<br />
formed the special Panzer Brigade 150<br />
(or Brandenburger) numbering about<br />
two thousand men, of whom one hundred<br />
and fifty could speak English. 9<br />
Captured Allied equipment (particularly<br />
tanks and jeeps), uniforms, identification<br />
papers, and the like were h<strong>as</strong>tily<br />
collected at the front and sent to Skorzeny’s<br />
headquarters. The disguised jeep<br />
parties did go into action with varying<br />
degrees of success on 16 December, but<br />
the Brandenburger Brigade would be<br />
engaged <strong>as</strong> a unit only in a single and<br />
abortive skirmish near Malmédy five<br />
days later.<br />
The airborne ph<strong>as</strong>e of Operation<br />
Greif, whose code name w<strong>as</strong> Hohes<br />
Venn, seems to have been completely an<br />
afterthought, for the orders setting up<br />
the operation were not issued until 8<br />
December. 10 Hitler, like most of the<br />
9 The original Brandenburg Division seems to<br />
have been none too happy that Skorzeny’s group<br />
w<strong>as</strong> given the name of the Brandenburgers. H.<br />
Kriegsheim, Getarnt, Getauescht und doch Getreu:<br />
Die Division “Brandenburg” (Berlin, 1958), p. 305.<br />
10 The story of the Hohes Venn operation is<br />
given by its leader in MS # P–051, Airborne<br />
Operations: A German Appraisal (Generalmajor<br />
Hellmuth Reinhardt) . Cf., the C.S.D.I.C. (U.K.)<br />
higher German commanders, had lost<br />
confidence in airdrop tactics after the<br />
many c<strong>as</strong>ualties suffered by the German<br />
paratroopers in the Crete jump. Then<br />
too, in late 1944 the necessarily lengthy<br />
training for paratroop units w<strong>as</strong> a lux-<br />
ury denied by the huge drain of battle-<br />
field losses. Apparently it w<strong>as</strong> Model<br />
who suggested that paratroop tactics be<br />
tried once again, but undoubtedly Hitler<br />
seized upon the proposal with alacrity<br />
although t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no longer a single<br />
regular paratroop regiment active in the<br />
Wehrmacht. Model wanted the jump<br />
to be made in the Krinkelt area, and<br />
one may wonder what effect such a ver-<br />
tical attack might have had on the fight<br />
put up at the twin villages by the Ameri-<br />
can 2d and 99th Infantry Divisions.<br />
Hitler, however, had one of his intuitive<br />
strokes and ordered the jump to be made<br />
north of Malmédy.<br />
His choice for commander devolved<br />
on Col. Friedrich A. Freiherr von der<br />
Heydte, a distinguished and experienced<br />
paratroop officer then commanding the<br />
Fallschirm Armee Waffen school w<strong>here</strong><br />
the nominal parachute regiments were<br />
being trained <strong>as</strong> ground troops. Colonel<br />
von der Heydte w<strong>as</strong> ordered to organize<br />
a thousand-man parachute formation for<br />
immediate use. Four days later von der<br />
Heydte received his tactical mission<br />
from the Sixth SS Panzer <strong>Army</strong> com-<br />
mander during an uncomfortable session<br />
in which Dietrich w<strong>as</strong> under the in-<br />
fluence of alcohol. The paratroopers<br />
were to jump at dawn on D-day, first<br />
opening the roads in the Hohes Venn<br />
leading from the Elsenborn-Malmédy<br />
area toward Eupen for the armored<br />
spearhead units, then blocking Allied<br />
documents S.I.R. 1377 (n.d.) and G.R.G.G. 359<br />
(c) 24 Sep 45.
THE ENEMY DASH WESTWARD AND OPERATION GREIF 271<br />
forces if these attempted to intervene.<br />
Colonel von der Heydte w<strong>as</strong> told that<br />
the German armor would reach him<br />
within twenty-four hours.<br />
The preparations for Operation<br />
Hohes Venn were rushed to completion.<br />
The troops received their equipment<br />
and a little jump training (many had<br />
never attended jump school) ; 112 war-<br />
weary, Junkers troop-carrier planes were<br />
gat<strong>here</strong>d with an ill-<strong>as</strong>sorted group of<br />
pilots, half of whom had never flown<br />
combat missions; 300 dummy figures<br />
were loaded for drops north of Camp<br />
Elsenborn to confuse the Americans<br />
(this turned out to be about the most<br />
successful feature of the entire oper-<br />
ation) ; and the pilots and jump-m<strong>as</strong>ters<br />
were given instructions-but no joint<br />
training. It must be said that these prep-<br />
arations for what would be the first<br />
German paratroop <strong>as</strong>sault at night and<br />
into woods left much to be desired.<br />
On the evening of 15 December Colo-<br />
nel von der Heydte formed his compa-<br />
nies to entruck for the move to Pader-<br />
born, w<strong>here</strong> the planes were <strong>as</strong>sembled.<br />
The trucks never arrived-they had no<br />
fuel. Now the jump w<strong>as</strong> ordered for<br />
0300 on the 17th. This time the jump<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made on schedule, although not<br />
quite <strong>as</strong> planned and into very bad cross<br />
winds. One rifle company w<strong>as</strong> dropped<br />
behind the German lines fifty kilo-<br />
meters away from the drop zone, most<br />
of the signal platoon fell just in front of<br />
the German positions south of Mon-<br />
schau, and the bulk of the command and<br />
the weapons packages were scattered al-<br />
most at random. Despite this bad be-<br />
ginning about one hundred paratroopers<br />
reached the rendezvous at the fork in<br />
the Eupen road north of Mont Rigi.<br />
Since this group w<strong>as</strong> obviously too weak<br />
for open action, Colonel von der Heydte<br />
formed camp in the woods and sent out<br />
patrols to pick up information and har<strong>as</strong>s<br />
the Americans in the vicinity. These pa-<br />
trols gat<strong>here</strong>d in stragglers until some<br />
three hundred paratroopers had <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembled, but it w<strong>as</strong> now too late to carry<br />
out the planned operation. On the night<br />
of the 21st the paratroopers were or-<br />
dered to find their way back to the Ger-<br />
man lines believed to be at Monschau.<br />
Von der Heydte w<strong>as</strong> taken prisoner two<br />
days later. The tactical effect of this h<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
ily conceived and ill-executed operation<br />
proved to be almost nil although Ameri-<br />
can commanders did dispatch troops on<br />
wild-goose ch<strong>as</strong>es which netted little but<br />
a few paratroopers, empty parachutes,<br />
and dummies . 11<br />
11 The<br />
repor ts of enemy paratroopers did result<br />
in numerous troop alerts in the American rear<br />
are<strong>as</strong>. For example, the 1102d, 1107th, and 1128th<br />
Engineer Groups were alerted. (VIII Corps, G–3<br />
Jnl, 16 Dec 44.) The German soldiery, surprisingly,<br />
were told of Colonel von der Heydte’s failure in<br />
an article entitled “Operation M<strong>as</strong>s Murder”<br />
which appeared in the Nachrichten Fur Die<br />
Truppe (the German equivalent of The Stars and<br />
Stripes) on 22 December 1944. This article, <strong>as</strong> the<br />
title implies, is extremely bitter over the lack of<br />
troop training and preparation.
CHAPTER XII<br />
The First Attacks at St.Vith<br />
St. Vith lay approximately twelve threefold: to insure the complete isomiles<br />
behind the front lines on 16 De- lation of the troops that might be<br />
cember. This w<strong>as</strong> an average Belgian trapped on the Schnee Eifel, to cover<br />
town, with a population of a little over the German supply lines unraveling be-<br />
2,000 and sufficient billets to house a hind the armored corps to the north<br />
division headquarters. It w<strong>as</strong> important, and south, and to feed reinforcements<br />
however, <strong>as</strong> the knot which tied the roads laterally into the main thrusts by using<br />
running around the important Eifel bar- the St. Vith road net. The closest of<br />
rier to the net which fanned out toward the northern armored routes, <strong>as</strong> these<br />
the north, south, and west. Six paved appeared on the German operations<br />
or macadam roads entered St. Vith. maps, ran through Recht, about five<br />
None of these were considered by the miles northwest of St. Vith. The closest<br />
German planners to be major military of the primary armored routes in the<br />
trunk lines, although in the late sum- south ran through Burg Reuland, some<br />
mer of 1944 work had been started to five miles south.<br />
recondition the road running e<strong>as</strong>t from St. Vith is built on a low hill sur-<br />
St. Vith to Stadtkyll <strong>as</strong> a branch of the rounded on all sides by slightly higher<br />
main military system, because normally rises. On the south the Braunlauf Creek<br />
the Schnee Eifel range served <strong>as</strong> a break- swings p<strong>as</strong>t St. Vith and from the stream<br />
water diverting heavy highway traffic so a draw extends to the west edge of the<br />
that it p<strong>as</strong>sed to the north or south of town. About a mile and a half to the<br />
St. Vith. (See Map III.)<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t a large wooded hill m<strong>as</strong>s rises <strong>as</strong><br />
In German plans the hub at St. Vith a screen. This is crossed by the road to<br />
w<strong>as</strong> important, but it w<strong>as</strong> not on the axis Schönberg, which then dips into the Our<br />
of any of the main armored thrusts. The valley and follows the north bank of the<br />
German armored corps advancing river until the Schönberg bridge is<br />
through the northe<strong>as</strong>tern Ardennes were reached, approximately six miles from<br />
slated to swing wide of the Schnee Eifel St. Vith.<br />
and St. Vith, the I SS Panzer Corps On the morning of 16 December the<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sing north, the L VIII Panzer Corps messages reporting the initial German<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sing south. But despite admonitions attacks in the 106th Division positions<br />
from the German High Command that were punctuated for the division staff<br />
the armored spearheads should race for- by occ<strong>as</strong>ional large-caliber shells falling<br />
ward without regard to their flanks it in St. Vith. This fire w<strong>as</strong> quite ineffectual<br />
w<strong>as</strong> obvious that St. Vith had to be and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little comprehension in<br />
taken early in the game. The re<strong>as</strong>on w<strong>as</strong> these early hours of the serious nature
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 273<br />
of the German attack. The attachment<br />
of CCB, 9th Armored Division, to<br />
the 106th Division late in the morning<br />
promised such aid <strong>as</strong> then seemed neces-<br />
sary, but Hoge’s command post w<strong>as</strong> at<br />
Monschau and he would not receive his<br />
orders from Jones until about 1800. As<br />
a result CCB began its move for St. Vith<br />
about 2000 on the 16th.<br />
As the size and direction of the first<br />
enemy effort began to <strong>as</strong>sume some<br />
shadowy form on the situation maps<br />
in the corps and division headquarters,<br />
General Middleton advised the 106th<br />
Division commander that he could use<br />
the 168th Engineer Combat Battalion,<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> engaged in routine duties<br />
around St. Vith and Vielsalm. This bat-<br />
talion (Lt. Col. W. L. Nungesser)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> at about half strength–attendance<br />
at schools or special <strong>as</strong>signments account-<br />
ed for the rest. The men had not been<br />
given any recent training in the use<br />
of bazook<strong>as</strong> or machine guns; a large<br />
percentage of the machine gunners<br />
would t<strong>here</strong>fore be killed in the fight<br />
for St. Vith. At 1030 on 17 December,<br />
reports of the German penetration from<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t led General Jones to send the<br />
168th out the St. Vith–Schönberg road<br />
with orders to defend <strong>as</strong>tride the road<br />
at the village of Heuem. While en route,<br />
the engineers met troopers of the 32d<br />
Cavalry who had been involved in a run-<br />
ning fight along the road west of Schön-<br />
berg. Heuem, they reported, w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
enemy hands and a German column w<strong>as</strong><br />
heading straight for St. Vith.<br />
On the morning of the 17th Colonel<br />
Slayden, VIII Corps’ <strong>as</strong>sistant G–2, and<br />
Lt. Col. Earle Williams, the 106th<br />
Division signal officer, while doing in-<br />
dependent scouting e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith, had<br />
seen the enemy and tapped the signal<br />
wire to <strong>as</strong>k for artillery interdiction of<br />
the highway. The combat engineer bat-<br />
talion deployed about two miles e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of St. Vith along the outer edge of a<br />
pine forest fringing the ridge m<strong>as</strong>k over<br />
which climbs the road from Schönberg.<br />
Here forty men or so of the 81st Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion (106th Division)<br />
joined the 168th. CCB, 9th Armored Di-<br />
vision, had p<strong>as</strong>sed St. Vith en route to<br />
aid the 424th Infantry, and a platoon of<br />
Troop C, 89th Cavalry Squadron, w<strong>as</strong><br />
commandeered to reinforce the watch<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of the town. 1 This little force w<strong>as</strong><br />
digging in when, at noon, the first<br />
enemy patrols were sighted.<br />
The 7th Armored Division<br />
Move to St. Vith<br />
When the counteroffensive began, the<br />
7th Armored Division (Brig. Gen. Robert<br />
W. H<strong>as</strong>brouck) w<strong>as</strong> in the XIII<br />
Corps reserve, planning for possible<br />
commitment in the Ninth <strong>Army</strong> Operation<br />
DAGGER intended to clear the Germans<br />
from the west bank of the Roer<br />
River once the dams were destroyed. 2<br />
1 The subsequent story of these units is threaded<br />
together from the VIII Corps G–2 and G–3 jour-<br />
nals; combat interviews with the VIII Corps staff<br />
and the 168th Engineer Battalion; the separate<br />
troop histories in the 89th Cavalry Reconnais-<br />
sance Squadron, AAR; the 168th Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion AAR; and the journals of CCB, 9th<br />
Armored. (The AAR of the latter is worthless<br />
and the journals are very confused; they do,<br />
however, have many map overlays from which the<br />
action can be traced.)<br />
2 The history of the 7th Armored in the battle<br />
of St. Vith is better documented than any part<br />
of the Ardennes story, with the sole exception of<br />
the defense of B<strong>as</strong>togne. All of the units organic<br />
to this command prepared AAR’s, including the<br />
division trains and artillery. The unit journals,<br />
<strong>as</strong> is common in an armored division, are rather<br />
slim, although, in this c<strong>as</strong>e, fairly accurate. A<br />
quite complete and accurate account w<strong>as</strong> prepared<br />
by one of the participants, Maj. Donald P. Boyer,
274 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
The division, <strong>as</strong>sembled about fifteen<br />
miles north of Aachen, had taken no<br />
part <strong>as</strong> a unit in the November<br />
drive toward the Roer, although com-<br />
panies and battalions on occ<strong>as</strong>ion had<br />
been attached to attacking infantry di-<br />
visions. The period of rest and refitting,<br />
after heavy fighting at Metz and in Hol-<br />
land, had put the 7th Armored in good<br />
condition. When General Bradley and<br />
the 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group staff met in the<br />
afternoon of the 16th to make a tenta-<br />
tive selection of divisions which could be<br />
taken from other fronts to reinforce the<br />
Ardennes sector, the choice in the north<br />
fell on H<strong>as</strong>brouck’s command. Actually<br />
t<strong>here</strong> were armored divisions in the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> closer to the scene, but they<br />
had been alerted for use in the first<br />
ph<strong>as</strong>es of the attacks planned to seize<br />
the Roer River dams (a design not<br />
abandoned until 17 December) and <strong>as</strong><br />
yet little sense of urgency attached to<br />
reinforcements in the VIII Corps area.<br />
General H<strong>as</strong>brouck received a tele-<br />
phone call at 1730 alerting his division<br />
for movement to the south (it took five<br />
more hours for the 7th Armored G–2<br />
to learn that “three or four German di-<br />
visions were attacking”) . Two hours<br />
later while the division <strong>as</strong>sembled<br />
and made ready, an advance party left<br />
the division command post at Heerlen,<br />
Holland, for B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>here</strong> it w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
receive instructions from the VIII Corps.<br />
Vielsalm, fourteen miles west of St. Vith<br />
by road, had already been designated <strong>as</strong><br />
the new <strong>as</strong>sembly area. At B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
Jr., in 1947 and w<strong>as</strong> published <strong>as</strong> St. Vith: The 7th<br />
Armored Division in the Battle of the Bulge, 17–<br />
23 December 1944. (I have used Major Boyer’s<br />
original typescript which is written in greater<br />
detail.) The combat interviews (particularly<br />
those compiled by Robert Merriam) are very in-<br />
formative.<br />
General Middleton outlined the mission:<br />
one combat command would be pre-<br />
pared to <strong>as</strong>sist the 106th Division, a<br />
second could be used if needed, but<br />
under no circumstances w<strong>as</strong> the third to<br />
be committed. The decision w<strong>as</strong> left to<br />
General H<strong>as</strong>brouck, who first w<strong>as</strong> to con-<br />
sult with the 106th Division <strong>as</strong> to how<br />
and when his leading combat command<br />
would be employed. Even at this hour<br />
the scope of the German counteroffen-<br />
sive w<strong>as</strong> but dimly seen and the 7th Ar-<br />
mored Division advance party w<strong>as</strong> in-<br />
formed that it would not be necessary<br />
to have the artillery accompany the com-<br />
bat command columns–in other words<br />
this would not be a tactical march from<br />
Heerlen to Vielsalm.<br />
The movement plans prepared by the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> staff <strong>as</strong>signed General H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck two routes of march: an e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
route, through Aachen, Eupen, Mal-<br />
médy, and Recht, on which CCR would<br />
move; a west route, through Ma<strong>as</strong>tricht,<br />
Verviers, and Stavelot, which would be<br />
used by the main body of the division.<br />
The division artillery, which had been<br />
firing in support of the XIII Corps, w<strong>as</strong><br />
not to displace until the late morning of<br />
17 December, when it would move on<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>tern route. Shortly after midnight<br />
the Ninth <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> informed that the<br />
two columns would depart at 0330 and<br />
0800; actually the western column moved<br />
out at 0430. The estimated time of ar-<br />
rival w<strong>as</strong> 1400, 17 December, and of<br />
closure 0200, 18 December. A couple of<br />
hours earlier the First <strong>Army</strong> headquar-<br />
ters had told General Middleton that<br />
the west column would arrive at 0700<br />
and close at 1900 on the 17th, and that<br />
the combat command on the e<strong>as</strong>t road<br />
would arrive at 1100 and close at 1700.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> on this estimate that General
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 275<br />
Middleton and the 106th Division com-<br />
mander b<strong>as</strong>ed their plans for a counter-<br />
attack by a combat command of the 7th<br />
Armored e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith early on 17<br />
December.<br />
Although this failure to make an ac-<br />
curate estimate of the time of arrival<br />
in the battle area bore on the fate of<br />
the two regiments on the Schnee Eifel,<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> merely a single event in the<br />
sequence leading to the final encircle-<br />
ment and lacked any decisive import.<br />
The business of computing the lateral<br />
movement of an armored division close<br />
to a front through which the enemy w<strong>as</strong><br />
breaking could hardly attain the exact-<br />
ness of a Leavenworth solution com-<br />
plete with march graphs and tables.<br />
None of the charts on traffic density com-<br />
monly used in general staff or armored<br />
school training could give a formula for<br />
establishing the coefficient of “friction”<br />
in war, in this c<strong>as</strong>e the m<strong>as</strong>s of jeeps,<br />
prime movers, guns, and trucks which<br />
jammed the roads along which the 7th<br />
Armored columns had to move to St.<br />
Vith. Also, the transmittal of the 7th<br />
Armored Division’s own estimate of its<br />
possible progress w<strong>as</strong> subject to “fric-<br />
tion.” This estimate w<strong>as</strong> received at the<br />
headquarters of the VIII Corps at 0500<br />
on 17 December, the first indication, it<br />
would appear, that the leading armored<br />
elements would arrive at 1400 instead<br />
of 0700 <strong>as</strong> planned. Thus far the Ninth<br />
<strong>Army</strong> had given H<strong>as</strong>brouck no informa-<br />
tion on the seriousness of the situation<br />
on the VIII Corps front.<br />
The advance party sent by General<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck reached St. Vith about<br />
0800 on 17 December, reporting to<br />
General Jones, who expected to find<br />
the armored columns right behind. Brig.<br />
Gen. Bruce Clarke, in advance of CCB,<br />
agreed with Jones’s recommendation that<br />
his combat command be organized<br />
upon arrival into two t<strong>as</strong>k forces and<br />
committed in an attack to clear the St.<br />
Vith–Schönberg road. At Schönberg the<br />
7th Armored t<strong>as</strong>k forces would turn<br />
south to join CCB of the 9th Armored<br />
Division, already engaged along the road<br />
to Winterspelt. If successful, the attack<br />
by the two combat commands would pro-<br />
vide escape corridors for the beleaguered<br />
regiments of the 106th.<br />
CCB of the 7th Armored had mean-<br />
while been making good progress and<br />
arrived at Vielsalm about 1100, halting<br />
just to the e<strong>as</strong>t to g<strong>as</strong> up. Although Viel-<br />
salm w<strong>as</strong> only fourteen miles by road<br />
from St. Vith, it would be literally a<br />
matter of hours before even the lightly<br />
armored advance guard could reach St.<br />
Vith. The m<strong>as</strong>s of artillery, cavalry, and<br />
supply vehicles moving painfully<br />
through St. Vith to the west–with and<br />
without orders–formed a current al-<br />
most impossible to bre<strong>as</strong>t. Although the<br />
mounted military police platoon in St.<br />
Vith had orders to sidetrack the with-<br />
drawing corps artillery when the armor<br />
appeared, the traffic jam had reached the<br />
point w<strong>here</strong> the efforts of a few MP’s<br />
were futile.<br />
General Jones, beset by messages re-<br />
porting the German advance along the<br />
Schönberg road, sent urgent requests for<br />
the armor to hurry. At 1300 German<br />
vehicles were seen in Setz, four and a<br />
half miles from the e<strong>as</strong>tern edge of St.<br />
Vith. Half an hour later three enemy<br />
tanks and some infantry appeared be-<br />
fore the 168th Engineer Battalion posi-<br />
tion <strong>as</strong>tride the St. Vith road. Care-<br />
lessly dismounting, one tank crew w<strong>as</strong><br />
riddled by machine gun fire; a second<br />
tank received a direct and killing bl<strong>as</strong>t
276<br />
from a bazooka; the third tank and the<br />
infantry withdrew. Another small Ger-<br />
man detachment deployed in front of the<br />
engineers an hour later w<strong>as</strong> engaged<br />
and w<strong>as</strong> finally put to flight by Ameri-<br />
can fighter planes in one of' their few<br />
appearances over the battlefield on this<br />
day.<br />
About the same time the 87th Cavalry<br />
Reconnaissance Squadron, temporarily<br />
under the command of Maj. Charles A.<br />
Cannon, Jr., reported to General Clarke<br />
in St. Vith, the first unit of the 7th<br />
Armored to reach the 106th Division.<br />
Troop B w<strong>as</strong> sent out the e<strong>as</strong>t road to<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
TRAFFIC JAM IN THE ST. VITH AREA<br />
reinforce the engineers, but the main<br />
body of the reconnaissance battalion de-<br />
ployed to screen the northe<strong>as</strong>tern ap-<br />
proaches to the Wallerode area. By this<br />
time it w<strong>as</strong> obvious to Jones and Clarke<br />
that the main forces of the 7th Armored<br />
could not reach St. Vith in time to<br />
make a daylight attack. General H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck reached St. Vith at 1600–<br />
it had taken him all of five hours to<br />
thread his way through the traffic jam<br />
between Vielsalm and St. Vith. He found<br />
that General Jones already had turned<br />
the defense of St. Vith over to Clarke<br />
and the 7th Armored Division. After a
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 277<br />
h<strong>as</strong>ty conference the counterattack w<strong>as</strong><br />
postponed until the following morning.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> just turning dark when the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sistant G–2 of the 7th Armored led<br />
a company of tanks and another of<br />
armored infantry into St. Vith. This de-<br />
tachment had literally forced its way,<br />
at pistol point and by threatening to run<br />
down the vehicles barring the road, from<br />
Vielsalm to St. Vith. About this time<br />
the Germans made another attempt,<br />
covered by artillery fire, to thrust a few<br />
tanks along the e<strong>as</strong>t road. Three Ameri-<br />
can tank destroyers which had been dug<br />
in at a bend in the road were abandoned<br />
-their crews shelled out by accurate<br />
enemy concentrations–but the attack<br />
made no further headway and perhaps<br />
w<strong>as</strong> intended only <strong>as</strong> a patrol action.<br />
The 106th Division now could report,<br />
“We have superior force in front of St.<br />
Vith.”<br />
Why did the LXVI Corps fail<br />
to make a determined push toward St.<br />
Vith on 17 December? German <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns or tanks had been spotted west of<br />
Schönberg <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> 0850. By noon<br />
German infantry were in Setz, with at<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t five hours of daylight remaining<br />
and less than five miles to go, much of<br />
that distance being uncontested. By mid-<br />
afternoon the enemy had reached the<br />
168th Engineer positions less than two<br />
miles from St. Vith. Yet at no time dur-<br />
ing the day did the Germans use more<br />
than three <strong>as</strong>sault guns and one or two<br />
platoons of infantry in the piecemeal<br />
attacks west of Schönberg. The succes-<br />
sive concentrations laid by the Ameri-<br />
can artillery on Schönberg and both sides<br />
of the road west–from 9 o’clock on-<br />
must have affected enemy movement<br />
considerably. The bombs dropped on<br />
Schönberg and its narrow streets late in<br />
the day may have delayed the arrival of<br />
reinforcements, and air attack certainly<br />
helped to scatter the most advanced Ger-<br />
man troops. The stand made by Troop<br />
B, 32d Cavalry Squadron, near Heuem<br />
and the later fight by the engineers gave<br />
the German point an excuse to report-<br />
<strong>as</strong> it did–the presence of “stubborn re-<br />
sistance” e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith.<br />
It seems likely, however, that only<br />
small German detachments actually<br />
reached the Schönberg–St. Vith road<br />
during the daylight hours of 17 De-<br />
cember. The German corps commander,<br />
General Lucht, had ordered the Mobile<br />
Battalion of the 28th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division up from reserve during<br />
the previous night with orders to ad-<br />
vance via Andler. (It will be remem-<br />
bered that the 18th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> charged with the encircle-<br />
ment and capture of St. Vith.) The<br />
Mobile Battalion (comprising three<br />
platoons of <strong>as</strong>sault guns, a company of<br />
engineers, and another of fusiliers) did<br />
not arrive at Schönberg until after noon.<br />
During the morning the division com-<br />
mander had led a battalion of the 294th<br />
Regiment to Schönberg, but seems to<br />
have halted t<strong>here</strong> (perhaps to secure the<br />
Schönberg bridge against recapture) ,<br />
sending only small detachments against<br />
Troop B at Heuem. With the arrival<br />
of the <strong>as</strong>sault guns some attempt w<strong>as</strong><br />
made to probe the American defenses<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith. This, however, w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
the main mission <strong>as</strong>signed the advance<br />
guard of the 18th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion, for the original plan of advance<br />
had called on the Mobile Battalion to<br />
seize the high ground at Wallerode,<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith, which overlooked<br />
the valley road from Schönberg. The<br />
bulk of the German advance guard, <strong>as</strong>
278 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
a result, toiled through the woods to-<br />
ward Wallerode, arriving t<strong>here</strong> in the<br />
early evening.<br />
An opportunity had been missed. Per-<br />
haps the German command did not<br />
realize the full extent of the gains won<br />
in the St. Vith area and w<strong>as</strong> wedded<br />
too closely to its prior plans. In any c<strong>as</strong>e<br />
the German armored reserve w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
available. Tanks of the Fuehrer Begleit<br />
Brigade, theoretically attached to the<br />
LXVI Corps but subject to commitment<br />
only on army orders, would not be re-<br />
le<strong>as</strong>ed for use at St. Vith until too late<br />
for a successful coup de main.<br />
On the movement of the main body<br />
of the 7th Armored Division on 17 De-<br />
cember hung the fate of St. Vith. Behind<br />
the reconnaissance and advance elements<br />
the bulk of the division moved slowly<br />
southward along the e<strong>as</strong>t and west lines<br />
of march, forty-seven and sixty-seven<br />
miles long, respectively. The division<br />
staff knew little of the tactical situation<br />
and nothing of the extent to which the<br />
German armored columns had penetrat-<br />
ed westward. It is probable that night-<br />
flying German planes spotted the Ameri-<br />
can columns in the early hours of the<br />
17th, but it is doubtful that the tank<br />
columns of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> travel-<br />
ing west on roads cutting across the 7th<br />
Armored routes were aware of this<br />
American movement. Actually CCR of<br />
the 7th Armored, on the e<strong>as</strong>tern route,<br />
came very close to colliding with the<br />
leading tank column of the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division south of Malmédy but<br />
cleared the road before the Germans<br />
crossed on their way west. The western<br />
column made its march without coming<br />
in proximity to the west-moving German<br />
spearheads, its main problem being to<br />
negotiate roads jammed with west-<br />
bound traffic.<br />
The division artillery, finally rele<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
in the north, took the e<strong>as</strong>t route, its<br />
three battalions and the 203d Antiaircraft<br />
Battalion moving <strong>as</strong> a single column.<br />
Early on the afternoon of the 17th<br />
the 440th Armored Field Artillery, leading<br />
the column, entered Malmédy, only<br />
to be greeted with the sign THIS ROAD<br />
UNDER ENEMY FIRE. The town square<br />
w<strong>as</strong> a scene of utter confusion. Trucks<br />
loaded with soldiers and nurses from a<br />
nearby hospital, supply vehicles, and<br />
civilians of military age on bicycles eddied<br />
around the square in an attempt<br />
to get on the road leading out to the<br />
west; a battalion from a replacement<br />
depot threaded its way on foot between<br />
the vehicles, also en route to the west.<br />
All that the artillery could learn w<strong>as</strong><br />
that a German tank column w<strong>as</strong> south<br />
of Malmédy. This, of course, w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
panzer detachment of the 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division.<br />
The 440th Armored Field Artillery<br />
Battalion, unable to reverse itself,<br />
turned west to Stavelot and subsequently<br />
joined the western group on its way to<br />
Vielsalm. Alerted by radio from the<br />
440th, Maj. W. J. Scott (acting in<br />
the absence of the artillery commander<br />
who had gone ahead to report at the<br />
division headquarters) turned the column<br />
around in the square and to avoid<br />
the narrow and congested road led it<br />
back toward Eupen, cutting in to the<br />
western divisional route at Verviers.<br />
This roundabout move consumed the<br />
daylight hours and through the night<br />
the gun carriages streamed along the<br />
Verviers-Vielsalm road. The main artillery<br />
column again missed the 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division by only a hair’s breadth.<br />
As Battery D, 203d Antiaircraft (AW)
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 279<br />
Battalion, at the tail of the column,<br />
rolled through Stavelot about 0800 on<br />
the morning of 18 December, it found<br />
itself in the middle of a fire fight be-<br />
tween the advance guard of the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division and a small American<br />
force of armored infantry, engineers,<br />
and tank destroyers. The battery swung<br />
its quadruple machine guns around for<br />
ground laying and moved into the fight,<br />
firing at the enemy <strong>as</strong>sembling along the<br />
banks of the Amblève River, which<br />
<strong>here</strong> ran through the south edge<br />
of the town. After an hour or so the<br />
battery turned once again and, taking<br />
no chances, circled wide to the west. It<br />
finally arrived in the division <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
area e<strong>as</strong>t of Vielsalm late in the after-<br />
noon. The bulk of the artillery column<br />
closed at Vielsalm during the morning,<br />
although the l<strong>as</strong>t few miles had to be<br />
made against the flow of vehicles surg-<br />
ing from the threatened area around St.<br />
Vith.<br />
While the 7th Armored Division artil-<br />
lery w<strong>as</strong> working its way onto the west<br />
road during the evening of 17 December,<br />
most of the division <strong>as</strong>sembled in the St.<br />
Vith area along positions roughly indic-<br />
ative of an unconsciously forming per-<br />
imeter defense. From Recht, five miles<br />
northwest of St. Vith, to Beho, seven<br />
miles to the southwest of the 106th Divi-<br />
sion headquarters, the clockwise dis-<br />
position of the American units w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong><br />
follows. At Recht were located the com-<br />
mand post of CCR and the rear head-<br />
quarters of CCB, with the 17th Tank<br />
Battalion <strong>as</strong>sembled to the southe<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
The disorganized 14th Cavalry Group<br />
w<strong>as</strong> dispersed through the area between<br />
Recht and Poteau. E<strong>as</strong>t of Hunningen the<br />
87th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron<br />
(–) had formed roadblocks to bar the<br />
northern and northe<strong>as</strong>tern approaches<br />
to St. Vith. <strong>To</strong> the right of the cavalry<br />
the most advanced units of CCB had<br />
reinforced the 168th Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion on the Schönberg road and<br />
pushed out to either side for some dis-<br />
tance <strong>as</strong> flank protection. During the<br />
night, CCB, 9th Armored Division, and<br />
the 424th Infantry withdrew across the<br />
Our River and established a defensive<br />
line along the hill chain running from<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t of Steinebrück south to Burg<br />
Reuland; these troops eventually made<br />
contact with the advance elements of<br />
CCB, 7th Armored Division. Some six<br />
or seven miles west of Burg Reuland,<br />
CCA of the 7th Armored had <strong>as</strong>sembled<br />
near Beho.<br />
West of St. Vith, in position to give<br />
close support, were located the 275th<br />
Armored Field Artillery Battalion (Lt.<br />
Col. Roy Udell Clay) and the remainder<br />
of CCB. The 275th, reinforced by the<br />
16th Armored Field Artillery Battalion,<br />
and three batteries of corps artillery,<br />
fired through the night to interdict the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern approaches to St. Vith; this w<strong>as</strong><br />
all the artillery support remaining to the<br />
American troops in this sector. The<br />
112th Infantry, now beginning to fold<br />
back to the north <strong>as</strong> the center of the<br />
28th Division gave way, w<strong>as</strong> no longer<br />
in contact with the 424th Infantry, its<br />
erstwhile left flank neighbor, but the<br />
axis of withdrawal ultimately would<br />
bring the 112th Infantry to piece out<br />
the southern sector of the defense slowly<br />
forming around St. Vith.<br />
While it is true that an outline or<br />
trace of the subsequent St. Vith perim-<br />
eter w<strong>as</strong> unraveling on the night of<br />
17–18 December, this w<strong>as</strong> strictly fortui-<br />
tous. General Jones and General H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck still expected that CCB would
280 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
make its delayed drive e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith<br />
on the morning of the 18th. The strength<br />
of the German forces thrusting west w<strong>as</strong><br />
not yet fully appreciated. Information<br />
on the location of the enemy or the<br />
routes he w<strong>as</strong> using w<strong>as</strong> extremely vague<br />
and generally several hours out of date.<br />
Communication between the higher<br />
American headquarters and their sub-<br />
ordinate units w<strong>as</strong> sporadic and, for long<br />
periods, nonexistent. Late in the evening<br />
of the 17th and during the morning of<br />
the 18th, however, the scope and direc-<br />
tion of the German drive thrusting p<strong>as</strong>t<br />
St. Vith in the north became more clear-<br />
ly discernible <strong>as</strong> the enemy struck in a<br />
series of attacks against Recht, Poteau,<br />
and Hünningen.<br />
The Enemy Strikes at the<br />
St. Vith Perimeter<br />
The 1st SS Panzer Division, forming<br />
the left of the I SS Panzer Corps advance<br />
in the zone north of St. Vith, had<br />
driven forward on two routes. The<br />
northern route, through Stavelot and the<br />
Amblève River valley, carried the main<br />
strength of the division, led by its pan-<br />
zer regiment. It w<strong>as</strong> the first group in<br />
this northern column which CCR had<br />
unwittingly eluded and from which the<br />
tail of the 7th Armored artillery column<br />
had glanced at Stavelot. The southern<br />
route, through Recht and Vielsalm,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed to a kampfgruppe of the<br />
1st SS Panzer Division made up of a<br />
reinforced panzer grenadier regiment<br />
and a battalion of <strong>as</strong>sault guns. This<br />
group had been delayed by poor roads<br />
and American mine fields west of Man-<br />
derfeld, and by the end of 17 December<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> some hours behind the north col-<br />
umn.<br />
The headquarters of CCR, 7th Ar-<br />
mored, opened in Recht in midafter-<br />
noon of the 17th. At that time the com-<br />
bat command retained only the 17th<br />
Tank Battalion (<strong>as</strong>sembled to the south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t) because its armored infantry bat-<br />
talion had been diverted to St. Vith.<br />
About 2045 CCR got its first word of the<br />
Germans it had so narrowly missed when<br />
the driver for the division chief of staff,<br />
Col. Church M. Matthews, appeared at<br />
the command post with the report that<br />
during the afternoon he had run afoul<br />
of a large tank column near Pont and<br />
that the colonel w<strong>as</strong> missing. 3 These Ger-<br />
mans, of course, were part of the north-<br />
ern column. Lt. Col. Fred M. Warren,<br />
acting commanding officer, sent the<br />
driver on to division headquarters to tell<br />
his story, and at the same time he <strong>as</strong>ked<br />
for a company of infantry. He then or-<br />
dered the 17th Tank Battalion (Lt. Col.<br />
John P. Wemple) to send a tank com-<br />
pany into Recht. Warren and Wemple<br />
studied the road net <strong>as</strong> shown on the<br />
map and agreed to try to hold Recht<br />
through the night. Stragglers came pour-<br />
ing through Recht in the meantime with<br />
rumors and reports of the enemy just<br />
behind them. The headquarters and<br />
tank company had little time to get set,<br />
for about 0200 the advance guard of<br />
the southern German column hit the<br />
village from the e<strong>as</strong>t and northe<strong>as</strong>t. Un-<br />
willing to risk his tanks without infantry<br />
protection in a night fight through nar-<br />
row streets, and uncertain of the<br />
enemy strength, Warren ordered a with-<br />
drawal after a sharp 45-minute engage-<br />
ment. CCR headquarters started down<br />
3 Colonel Matthews’ body. w<strong>as</strong> discovered about a<br />
month later. Col. John L. Ryan, Jr.. who had<br />
commanded CCR, became the 7th Armored chief<br />
of staff.
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 281<br />
the road southwest toward Vielsalm, and<br />
the tanks rejoined Wemple.<br />
Made cautious by the collision at<br />
Recht, the German column moved slow-<br />
ly, putting out feelers to the southe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
before the main force resumed the<br />
march southwest along the Vielsalm<br />
road. Wemple and his tankers were able<br />
to repel these probing attempts without<br />
difficulty. CCR headquarters had mean-<br />
while become ensnarled with the rem-<br />
nants of the 14th Cavalry Group and the<br />
residue of the corps artillery columns<br />
at the little village of Poteau, w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
roads from Recht and St. Vith join en<br />
route to Vielsalm. This crossroads ham-<br />
let had been the worst bottleneck in<br />
the traffic jam on 17 December; indeed<br />
the situation seems to have been com-<br />
pletely out of hand when the CCR head-<br />
quarters arrived in the early morning<br />
hours and succeeded in restoring some<br />
order.<br />
On the afternoon of 17 December the<br />
14th Cavalry Group commander had<br />
ordered the remnants of his two squad-<br />
rons to fall back to Recht. Through<br />
some confusion in orders both squadrons<br />
got onto the St. Vith–Poteau highway,<br />
although three reconnaissance teams did<br />
reach Recht and took part in the action<br />
t<strong>here</strong>. About midnight orders from the<br />
106th Division arrived at the group head-<br />
quarters which had been set up in Po-<br />
teau: the cavalry were to return to Born,<br />
which they had just evacuated, and<br />
occupy the high ground. By this time<br />
most of the 32d Squadron had threaded<br />
their way south through Poteau, appar-<br />
ently unaware that the group had es-<br />
tablished a command post t<strong>here</strong>. Short-<br />
ly after dark Colonel Devine departed<br />
with most of his staff for the 106th<br />
Division command post, but this com-<br />
mand group w<strong>as</strong> ambushed near Recht<br />
(Colonel Devine and two of his officers<br />
escaped on foot).<br />
Early on the 18th, Lt. Col. Augustine<br />
Duggan, senior of the remaining staff,<br />
intercepted elements of the 18th Squad-<br />
ron, part of Troop C, 32d Squad-<br />
ron, and the one remaining platoon of<br />
towed 3-inch guns from the 820th Tank<br />
Destroyer. These were placed under the<br />
command of Maj. J. L. Mayes <strong>as</strong><br />
a t<strong>as</strong>k force to comply with the orders<br />
from division. With great difficulty the<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force vehicles were sorted out, lined<br />
the road, and then turned about and<br />
faced toward Recht. Mayes’s group<br />
moved out from the crossroads at first<br />
light on 18 December but had gone only<br />
some two hundred yards when flame shot<br />
up from the leading light tank and an<br />
armored car, the two struck almost si-<br />
multaneously by German bazooka fire.<br />
The glare thrown over the snow sil-<br />
houetted the figures of enemy infantry-<br />
men advancing toward the Poteau cross-<br />
roads. The t<strong>as</strong>k force pulled back into<br />
the village and h<strong>as</strong>tily prepared a de-<br />
fense around the dozen or so houses<br />
t<strong>here</strong>, while to the north a small cavalry<br />
patrol dug in on a hill overlooking the<br />
hamlet and made a fight of it. By this<br />
time the l<strong>as</strong>t of the milling traffic w<strong>as</strong><br />
leaving Poteau; eight 8-inch howitzers<br />
of the 740th Field Artillery Battalion<br />
were abandoned <strong>here</strong> <strong>as</strong> the German<br />
fire incre<strong>as</strong>ed, ostensibly because they<br />
could not be hauled out of the mud<br />
onto the road.<br />
All through the morning the enemy<br />
pressed in on Poteau, moving his ma-<br />
chine guns, mortars, and <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
closer and closer. At noon the situation<br />
w<strong>as</strong> critical, the village w<strong>as</strong> raked by<br />
fire, and the t<strong>as</strong>k force w<strong>as</strong> no longer
282<br />
in communication with any other Americans.<br />
Colonel Duggan finally gave the<br />
order to retire down the road to Vielsalm.<br />
Three armored cars, two jeeps, and<br />
one light tank were able to disengage<br />
and carried the wounded out; apparently<br />
a major part of the force w<strong>as</strong> able<br />
to make its way to Vielsalm on foot.<br />
During the early morning Headquarters,<br />
CCR, set out from Poteau, heading<br />
down the valley road toward Vielsalm.<br />
At the small village of Petit Thier<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> discovered that a lieutenant from<br />
the 23d Armored Infantry Battalion,<br />
separated from his column on the march<br />
south, had heard the firing at Poteau<br />
and had rounded up a collection of<br />
stray tanks, infantry, cavalry, and engineers<br />
to block the way to Vielsalm. 4 The<br />
CCR commander took over this roadblock<br />
and, <strong>as</strong> the force swelled through<br />
the day with incoming stragglers and<br />
lost detachments, extended the position<br />
west of the village. The German column<br />
at Poteau, however, made no attempt to<br />
drive on to Vielsalm. The main body<br />
of the 1st SS Panzer Division needed<br />
reinforcements. The panzer grenadier<br />
regiment and the <strong>as</strong>sault guns t<strong>here</strong>fore<br />
were ordered off their <strong>as</strong>signed route and<br />
turned northe<strong>as</strong>t to follow the column<br />
through Stavelot.<br />
The 7th Armored counterattack from<br />
St. Vith to relieve the two trapped regiments<br />
of the 106th Division had been<br />
postponed on the 17th, not canceled.<br />
During the early morning hours of 18<br />
December preparation w<strong>as</strong> completed<br />
for the attack on Schönberg by the 31st<br />
Tank Battalion and the 23d Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion, now brigaded under<br />
4 This outfit w<strong>as</strong> called T<strong>as</strong>k Force Navaho, so<br />
named because its leader had worked his way<br />
through college selling Indian blankets.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
CCB. This w<strong>as</strong> risky business at best.<br />
The divisional artillery would not be in<br />
position to support the attack. The<br />
similar effort by CCB, 9th Armored Divi-<br />
sion, had been called off and the Ameri-<br />
can forces south of the 422d Infantry<br />
and 423d Infantry had withdrawn be-<br />
hind the Our. That the German strength<br />
w<strong>as</strong> incre<strong>as</strong>ing w<strong>as</strong> made apparent by<br />
the events during the night of 17–18<br />
December, but the 7th Armored light<br />
observation planes were not available<br />
for scouting the enemy dispositions or<br />
movements e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith. General<br />
Clarke w<strong>as</strong> well aware of the chancy<br />
nature of this enterprise and, at 0645,<br />
when reporting to Colonel Ryan, the<br />
division chief of staff, pointed out that<br />
General H<strong>as</strong>brouck still had the option<br />
of canceling the attack.<br />
It would be the enemy, however, and<br />
not a command decision that forced the<br />
abandonment of the proposed effort.<br />
About 0800 the Germans launched a re-<br />
connaissance in force northe<strong>as</strong>t of St.<br />
Vith, advancing from Wallerode to-<br />
ward Hünningen. Here, only two thou-<br />
sand yards from St. Vith, two troops of<br />
the 87 th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squad-<br />
ron and a few antiaircraft half-tracks<br />
offered the sole barrier to a thrust into<br />
the city. Who made up the enemy force<br />
and its strength is uncertain–probably<br />
this w<strong>as</strong> the Mobile Battalion of the 18th<br />
Yolks Grenadier Division, making the<br />
preliminary move in the scheme to en-<br />
circle St. Vith. In any event enough<br />
pressure w<strong>as</strong> exerted during the morn-<br />
ing to drive the small American screen-<br />
ing force back toward St. Vith.<br />
As the cavalry commenced its delay-<br />
ing action a hurried call went out to<br />
CCB, 9th Armored, for tanks and anti-<br />
tank guns. Moving through St. Vith,
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 283<br />
two companies from the 14th Tank Bat-<br />
talion (Maj. Leonard E. Engeman) and<br />
one from the 811th Tank Destroyer Bat-<br />
talion took over the fight. One company<br />
of Shermans circled in the direction of<br />
Wallerode, falling on the enemy flank<br />
while the tank destroyers contained the<br />
head of the German column on the Hün-<br />
nange road. Both American units were<br />
able to drive forward and the Shermans<br />
knocked out six light panzers or <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault guns. By this time the 7th Armored<br />
plans for the Schönberg attack were<br />
definitely off and a company from the<br />
31st Tank Battalion joined in the affair.<br />
American losses were small, the Ger-<br />
man foray w<strong>as</strong> checked, and before the<br />
day closed the Hiinningen position w<strong>as</strong><br />
restored, but it w<strong>as</strong> clear that the enemy<br />
now w<strong>as</strong> concentrating to the north <strong>as</strong><br />
well <strong>as</strong> to the e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith.<br />
Like the probing thrust at Hünnange,<br />
the German efforts on the road e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of St. Vith during 18 December were<br />
advance guard actions fought while the<br />
main German force <strong>as</strong>sembled. The 18th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division, charged with<br />
the initial attack against St. Vith, actually<br />
w<strong>as</strong> riding two horses at the same time,<br />
attempting to close up for a decisive<br />
blow at St. Vith while maintaining the<br />
northern arc of the circle around the<br />
Americans on the Schnee Eifel. This<br />
tactical problem w<strong>as</strong> made more diffi-<br />
cult for the 18th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion and the LXVI Corps by the traffic<br />
situation on the roads e<strong>as</strong>t and north<br />
of Schönberg w<strong>here</strong> columns belonging<br />
to the Sixth SS Panzer <strong>Army</strong> were swing-<br />
ing out of their proper zone. Although<br />
the corps commander, General Lucht,<br />
personally intervened to “rank” the in-<br />
truders out of the area he seems to have<br />
been only moderately successful. Then,<br />
too, the artillery belonging to the divi-<br />
sion had been turned inward against the<br />
Schnee Eifel pocket on 18 December;<br />
only one battalion got up to the Schön-<br />
berg-St. Vith road. 5<br />
The attacks made e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith on<br />
18 December were carried by a part<br />
of the 294th Infantry, whose patrols had<br />
been checked by the 168th Engineers the<br />
previous day. Three times the grenadiers<br />
tried to rush their way through the fox-<br />
hole line held by the 38th Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion (Lt. Col. William<br />
H. G. Fuller) and B Troop of the 87th<br />
<strong>as</strong>tride the Schönberg road. The second<br />
attempt, just before noon, w<strong>as</strong> made<br />
under cover of a creeping barrage laid<br />
down by the German artillery battalion<br />
near Schönberg and momentarily shook<br />
the American firing line. But the ar-<br />
mored infantry, rallied by their officers<br />
and aided by Nungesser’s engineers,<br />
drove back the attackers. The l<strong>as</strong>t Ger-<br />
man <strong>as</strong>sault, begun after a two-hour fire<br />
fight, made a dent in the center of the<br />
38th Armored Infantry line. Again the<br />
168th Engineers gave a hand, the bulk of<br />
the 23d Armored Infantry Battalion<br />
appeared to reinforce the line e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
St. Vith, and by dark all lost ground had<br />
been retaken. During this entire action<br />
the 275th Armored Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talion, emplaced along the Recht road<br />
northwest of St. Vith, fired concentration<br />
after concentration against the enemy<br />
thrusting against the 38th and the engi-<br />
neers. Observation w<strong>as</strong> poor–the 18th<br />
w<strong>as</strong> a day of low-hanging fog–but the<br />
nine hundred rounds plunging onto the<br />
Schönberg road did much to check the<br />
grenadiers,<br />
5 The German operations are discussed in MSS<br />
# B–333 (Lucht). and B–688 (Moll). See also<br />
ETHINT #21.
284<br />
Although the 18th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> able, on this third day of<br />
the counteroffensive, to push some of its<br />
troops close in toward St. Vith, the 62d<br />
Volks Grenadier Division on the left<br />
had moved more slowly. Despite the<br />
American withdrawal from the Winter-<br />
spelt-Heckhuscheid area and the<br />
promptings of the impatient commander<br />
of the LXVI Corps, the 62d only<br />
tardily brought itself into conformity<br />
with the forward kampfgruppen of the<br />
18th Volks Grenadier Division. The<br />
164th Regiment, reinforced by engineers<br />
and <strong>as</strong>sault guns, apparently took some<br />
time to re-form after its fight with<br />
the 9th Armored Division counterattack<br />
force on 17 December. Although Ger-<br />
man patrols continued up the road to<br />
Steinebrück, attempting in vain to seize<br />
the bridge during the night, the attack<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not pressed until after daylight on<br />
the following morning. Two of the<br />
three Our bridges chosen for capture in<br />
the LXVI Corps’ plan now were in Ger-<br />
man hands, but the bridge at Steine-<br />
brück still had to be taken.<br />
The bend in the Our River near<br />
Steinebrück necessitated a switch in the<br />
new American positions on the far bank;<br />
thus while the main frontage held by<br />
the 424th and CCB, 9th Armored, faced<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, the line at Steinebrück faced south,<br />
then swung back until it again faced<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. In this sector Troop D, 89th<br />
Cavalry Reconnaissance Battalion, plus<br />
a light tank platoon and an <strong>as</strong>sault gun<br />
platoon, w<strong>as</strong> deployed along the 3,000-<br />
yard stretch between Steinebrück and<br />
Weppler, its left flank in the air at the<br />
latter village, its right more or less se-<br />
cured by a provisional company from the<br />
424th Infantry west of Steinebrück.<br />
On the morning of 18 December Gen-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
eral Hoge, CCB commander, w<strong>as</strong> or-<br />
dered to hurry to the 106th headquarters<br />
w<strong>here</strong> he w<strong>as</strong> told of the threat develop-<br />
ing north of St. Vith. When he sent<br />
back orders for the emergency t<strong>as</strong>k force<br />
from CCB to h<strong>as</strong>ten north, the cavalry<br />
troop w<strong>as</strong> included. Covered by one re-<br />
connaissance platoon and the cavalry <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault guns, sited near the bridge, the<br />
remaining platoons of Troop D had left<br />
their positions and started filing toward<br />
the. Steinebrück–St. Vith road when<br />
suddenly the movement order w<strong>as</strong> can-<br />
celed. The cavalry had been under fire<br />
since daybreak, and when the 2d Pla-<br />
toon attempted to return to its position<br />
on a commanding hill between Steine-<br />
brück and Weppler it w<strong>as</strong> forced to move<br />
dismounted in a rain of bullets and<br />
shells. At the Steinebrück bridge the en-<br />
emy incre<strong>as</strong>ed in number <strong>as</strong> the morning<br />
progressed, slipping into positions on the<br />
south bank under cover given by ex-<br />
ploding smoke shells. <strong>To</strong> counter this<br />
threat the light tank platoon moved in-<br />
to Steinebrück, leaving the American<br />
left uncovered. About the same time the<br />
provisional rifle company west of Steine-<br />
brück took off and one of the cavalry<br />
platoons had to be switched h<strong>as</strong>tily to<br />
cover this gap.<br />
Thus far the all-important bridge had<br />
been left intact, for t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> still some<br />
hope that the 423d Infantry, at the le<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
might free itself from the Schnee Eifel<br />
trap. By noon the situation w<strong>as</strong> such that<br />
the little group of troopers dared delay<br />
no longer. On General Hoge’s order a<br />
platoon of armored engineers went down<br />
and blew the bridge–almost in the teeth<br />
of the grenadiers on the opposite bank.<br />
An hour later the platoon west of the<br />
village saw an enemy column of horse-<br />
drawn artillery driving into position.
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 285<br />
The American gunners in the group-<br />
ment west of Lommersweiler immedi-<br />
ately answered the cavalry call for aid,<br />
apparently with some effect: yet within<br />
the hour at le<strong>as</strong>t a part of the twenty-<br />
two enemy guns counted <strong>here</strong> were in<br />
action, firing in preparation for an <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault across the river. It would seem that<br />
a German rifle company first crossed<br />
into Weppler, now unoccupied, then<br />
wheeled and encircled the 2d Platoon<br />
on the hill. Only five Americans es-<br />
caped. 6 Two or more companies crossed<br />
near the bl<strong>as</strong>ted bridge and by 1530,<br />
despite the continual pounding admin-<br />
istered by the 16th Armored Field Artil-<br />
lery Battalion and the rapid fire from the<br />
cavalry tank, <strong>as</strong>sault, and machine guns,<br />
had nearly encircled Troop D. A cavalry<br />
request for medium tanks perforce w<strong>as</strong><br />
denied; the tank companies sent north<br />
to Hünningen had not yet returned and<br />
General Hoge had no reserve. A com-<br />
pany of the 27th Armored Infantry Bat-<br />
talion, however, w<strong>as</strong> put in to cover the<br />
cavalry left flank. With the enemy infan-<br />
try inside Steinebrück and excellent<br />
direct laying by the German gunners<br />
picking off the American vehicles one<br />
by one, the cavalry withdrew along the<br />
St. Vith road.<br />
The CCB position at the Our (w<strong>here</strong><br />
two companies of armored infantry, a<br />
company each of light and medium<br />
tanks, plus the reconnaissance company,<br />
were deployed on a front over 4,000<br />
yards) w<strong>as</strong> no longer tenable. T<strong>here</strong> had<br />
been no contact whatever with the 424th<br />
Infantry to the south. General Hoge con-<br />
ferred with General Jones at St. Vith<br />
6 2d Lt. R. L. Westbrook commanded this pla-<br />
toon. Although severely wounded he led the sur-<br />
vivors to safety, then went back to his platoon’s<br />
position to search for stragglers. He w<strong>as</strong> given<br />
the DSC.<br />
and the two decided that the combat<br />
command should withdraw from the<br />
river northwest to slightly higher ground.<br />
Commencing at dark, the move w<strong>as</strong><br />
made without trouble and CCB settled<br />
along an arc whose center w<strong>as</strong> about<br />
two and a half miles southe<strong>as</strong>t of St.<br />
Vith. In this position the combat com-<br />
mand blocked the main Winterspelt–<br />
St. Vith highway and the valley of the<br />
Braunlauf Creek, a second natural cor-<br />
ridor leading to St. Vith. The gap be-<br />
tween Hoge’s command and CCB, 7th<br />
Armored, which at dark had been 3,000<br />
yards across, closed during the night<br />
when a light tank company and an anti-<br />
aircraft battery came in. Later, liaison<br />
w<strong>as</strong> established with the 424th Infantry<br />
on the right, which had been out of<br />
contact with the enemy during the day<br />
and remained in its river line position.<br />
Although the 62d Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> quick to occupy the ground<br />
vacated by CCB, no attempt w<strong>as</strong> made<br />
to follow into the new American posi-<br />
tion.<br />
During the afternoon of 18 December<br />
while the combat commands of the 7th<br />
and 9th Armored Divisions were fight-<br />
ing holding actions along the e<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
front of the St. Vith area, General H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck engaged in an attempt to restore<br />
the northern flank of the 7th Armored<br />
in the Poteau sector. The opportunity<br />
for a decisive American counterattack to-<br />
ward Schönberg w<strong>as</strong> p<strong>as</strong>t, if indeed it<br />
had ever existed, and H<strong>as</strong>brouck’s im-<br />
mediate concern w<strong>as</strong> to establish his divi-<br />
sion north flank in a posture of defense<br />
in the St. Vith–Vielsalm area. The loss<br />
of the vital road junction at Poteau,<br />
earlier in the day, made the connection<br />
between the forces of the division at<br />
St. Vith, around Recht, and in the Viel-
286 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
salm <strong>as</strong>sembly area, more difficult and<br />
tenuous. Then too, it appeared that the<br />
enemy w<strong>as</strong> concentrating in Recht and<br />
might try an attack through Poteau to<br />
Vielsalm. CCA (Col. Dwight A. Rose-<br />
baum) , watching the southern flank of<br />
the 7th Armored around Beho, had not<br />
yet met the Germans (who were in fact<br />
driving p<strong>as</strong>t to the west, but on roads<br />
south of Beho) . General H<strong>as</strong>brouck de-<br />
cided to leave a small force <strong>as</strong> observers<br />
around Beho and commit CCA to re-<br />
cover Poteau.<br />
At noon the 48th Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion and the 40th Tank Battalion<br />
(–) , representing the bulk of CCA,<br />
rolled through St. Vith and out along the<br />
Vielsalm road. As the leading tank pla-<br />
toon hove in sight of Poteau it came<br />
immediately under small arms and <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault gun fire. The few houses <strong>here</strong> were<br />
separated by an abandoned railroad cut,<br />
just south of the crossroads, which ran<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t and west. Colonel Rosebaum sent<br />
the tank platoon and an armored in-<br />
fantry company to clear the houses south<br />
of the cut. This action continued<br />
through the afternoon, while tanks and<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns played a dangerous game<br />
of hide-and-seek from behind the houses<br />
and the American infantry tried to knock<br />
out the German machine guns enfilading<br />
the railroad cut. <strong>To</strong>ward dark the Amer-<br />
icans crossed the northern embankment<br />
and reached the road junction. Rose-<br />
baum posted the infantry company-<br />
now supported by an entire tank com-<br />
pany–to hold the village, cheek by jowl<br />
with the Germans in the northernmost<br />
houses. Thus far CCA had no contact<br />
with CCR headquarters and its scratch<br />
force to the west at Petit Thier because<br />
the road from Poteau w<strong>as</strong> under fire.<br />
With the Poteau crossroad more or<br />
less in the hands of the 7th Armored,<br />
with a defensive arc forming north, e<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
and southe<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith, and with the<br />
Vielsalm–Petit Thier area under con-<br />
trol in the west, the next step w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
block the possible routes of approach<br />
from the south and southwest. Nearly<br />
all the American units in the St. Vith<br />
area were already committed; all that<br />
General H<strong>as</strong>brouck could do w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
station a light tank company, a company<br />
of armored engineers, the headquarters<br />
battery of an antiaircraft battalion, and<br />
a reconnaissance troop piecemeal in a<br />
series of small villages south and west<br />
of Beho. At best these isolated detach-<br />
ments could serve only <strong>as</strong> pickets for the<br />
7th Armored, but fortunately the Ger-<br />
man columns continued marching west.<br />
One brief engagement w<strong>as</strong> fought on<br />
the 18th at Gouvy, a rail and road junc-<br />
tion southwest of Beho. The headquar-<br />
ters battery, 440th Antiaircraft (AW)<br />
Battalion (Lt. Col. Robert O. Stone),<br />
and a light tank platoon had been sent<br />
to set up an outpost at the village. As<br />
they approached Gouvy station, a rail-<br />
road stop south of the village, they ran<br />
afoul of three German tanks which were<br />
just coming in from the south. The Ger-<br />
mans started a d<strong>as</strong>h to sweep the column<br />
broadside, but the first shot knocked out<br />
an air-compressor truck whose unwieldy<br />
hulk effectively blocked the road. After<br />
firing their l<strong>as</strong>t rounds at the town and<br />
the column, the German tanks with-<br />
drew. When Stone took a look around<br />
he found himself in charge of a rail-<br />
head stock of 80,000 rations-which had<br />
been set ablaze by the depot guards-<br />
an engineer vehicle park, and 350 Ger-<br />
mans in a POW cage. Fortunately the<br />
fire could be checked without too much<br />
damage. Stone then organized a defense
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 287<br />
with the engineers, ordnance, and quar-<br />
term<strong>as</strong>ter people on the spot. Unwit-<br />
tingly, in the process of “freezing” this<br />
heterogeneous command, Stone stopped<br />
the westward withdrawal of badly need-<br />
ed engineer vehicles (carrying earth<br />
augers, air compressors, and similar<br />
equipment) which the VIII Corps com-<br />
mander w<strong>as</strong> attempting to gather for<br />
work on a barrier line being constructed<br />
by the corps engineers farther to the<br />
west.<br />
The artillery battalions of the 7th Ar-<br />
mored Division were in firing positions<br />
north and e<strong>as</strong>t of Vielsalm at the close<br />
of 18 December. They could not give<br />
RAILROAD YARDS AT GOUVY<br />
aid to CCB, e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith, but t<strong>here</strong><br />
the 275th Armored Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talion w<strong>as</strong> in range and already had giv-<br />
en a fine demonstration of effective<br />
support. The 7th Armored trains, which<br />
had reached Salmchâteau by the west-<br />
ern route on the morning of the 18th,<br />
were sent twenty-two miles west of La<br />
Roche, partly to keep them out of enemy<br />
reach but also because of the possibility<br />
that the division might soon have to re-<br />
tire behind the Ourthe River. The re-<br />
serve available to General H<strong>as</strong>brouck<br />
w<strong>as</strong> scant for such wide-flung positions:<br />
some 90-mm. guns from the 814th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion and the provisional
288<br />
squadron being formed from the re-<br />
mains of the 14th Cavalry Group.<br />
Late in the day General Jones moved<br />
the 106th command post to Vielsalm,<br />
setting up near General H<strong>as</strong>brouck’s<br />
headquarters. The orders given the 7th<br />
Armored Division still held—to <strong>as</strong>sist<br />
the 106th Division. In fact, however,<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little left of the 106th; so re-<br />
sponsibility tended to devolve on the<br />
junior commander, H<strong>as</strong>brouck.<br />
The two generals had only a vague<br />
idea of what w<strong>as</strong> happening beyond their<br />
own sp<strong>here</strong>. Telephone service to the<br />
VIII Corps headquarters at B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
ended on 18 December when that head-<br />
quarters moved to Neufchâteau. But<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck had no doubt that General<br />
Middleton counted on the continued de-<br />
fense of the St. Vith road center—this<br />
part of the mission needed no reiteration.<br />
Since the VIII Corps itself w<strong>as</strong> in posses-<br />
sion of only fragmentary information<br />
on the German strength and locations<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little to be p<strong>as</strong>sed on to the<br />
division commanders.<br />
Liaison and staff officers coming<br />
from B<strong>as</strong>togne brought word of only<br />
meager American reinforcements any-<br />
w<strong>here</strong> in the neighborhood of St. Vith.<br />
One regiment of the 30th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> in Malmédy, thirteen or four-<br />
teen miles to the north, but the<br />
intervening countryside w<strong>as</strong> swamped<br />
ANTITANK GUNNERS GUARDING A CROSSING near Vielsalm in the 7th Armored Division<br />
area.
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 289<br />
by German columns heading west. The<br />
82d Airborne Division, it w<strong>as</strong> estimated,<br />
would reach Werbomont (about the<br />
same distance northwest of Vielsalm)<br />
on the morning of 19 December, but it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> apparent that in this area also the<br />
enemy barred any solid contact with the<br />
St. Vith defenders. At B<strong>as</strong>togne the 101st<br />
Airborne Division w<strong>as</strong> arriving to take<br />
over the fight at that critical road junc-<br />
tion, but t<strong>here</strong> were no additional rein-<br />
forcements which General Middleton<br />
could employ in plugging the gap be-<br />
tween St. Vith and B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The problem of maintaining control<br />
over the heterogeneous formations in<br />
the St. Vith–Vielsalm area or of giv-<br />
ing complete tactical unity to the de-<br />
fense w<strong>as</strong> very difficult. Under sustained<br />
German pressure a wholly satisfactory<br />
solution never would be achieved. The<br />
piecemeal employment of lower units,<br />
made unavoidable by the march of<br />
events, resulted in most involved meth-<br />
ods of communication. A tank company,<br />
for example, might have to report by<br />
radio through its own battalion head-<br />
quarters, some distance away, which<br />
then relayed the message on other chan-<br />
nels until it reached the infantry battal-<br />
ion to which the tank company w<strong>as</strong><br />
attached. The homogeneity of the bat-<br />
talion, in American practice the b<strong>as</strong>ic<br />
tactical unit, largely ce<strong>as</strong>ed to exist, nor<br />
did time and the enemy ever permit any<br />
substantial regrouping to restore this<br />
unity. It is surprising that under the<br />
circumstances control and communica-<br />
tion functioned <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> they did. But<br />
the 7th Armored Division w<strong>as</strong> a veteran<br />
organization; the general officers in the<br />
area dealt with one another on a very<br />
co-operative b<strong>as</strong>is; and within the sub-<br />
commands, established around the coa-<br />
lescing perimeter, the local commanders<br />
acted with considerable freedom and<br />
initiative.<br />
Although all intention of attempting<br />
to breach the German ring around the<br />
two regiments of the 106th Division had<br />
been abandoned on 18 December and<br />
the mission no longer w<strong>as</strong> counterat-<br />
tack, but rather defense in place, t<strong>here</strong><br />
still w<strong>as</strong> a faint hope that the 422d and<br />
423d somehow might be able to fight<br />
their way out through Schönberg <strong>as</strong> Gen-<br />
eral Jones had ordered. During the<br />
early morning hours of 19 December<br />
messages from the 423d Infantry (dis-<br />
patched at noon on the previous day)<br />
finally reached Vielsalm. From these<br />
Jones learned that both regiments had<br />
begun the attack westward, but no word<br />
on the progress of the attack followed-<br />
nor did the American outposts on the<br />
Schönberg road catch any sound of fir-<br />
ing moving west. Finally, late in the<br />
evening, a radio message arrived from<br />
the VII Corps: bad weather had inter-<br />
vened; the supplies promised the en-<br />
trapped troops had not been dropped.<br />
By this time the l<strong>as</strong>t bit of hope for<br />
the lost regiments must have gone.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> one fortunate but unex-<br />
pected event on the 19th. The exact<br />
location and strength of the 112th In-<br />
fantry, somew<strong>here</strong> south of the 424th,<br />
were unknown. 7 That a gap existed on<br />
the right of the 424th w<strong>as</strong> known. Early<br />
on 19 December word reached General<br />
Jones by way of liaison officer that, <strong>as</strong><br />
of the previous evening, the 112th In-<br />
fantry w<strong>as</strong> cut off from the 28th Divi-<br />
sion and had fallen back from the Our<br />
to the neighborhood of Weiswampach.<br />
A few hours later more information fil-<br />
7 See above, pp. 204–05.
290 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tered back to Vielsalm: the 112th had<br />
withdrawn to Huldange, thus coming<br />
closer to the 7th Armored and 106th.<br />
Finally, in midafternoon, Colonel Nel-<br />
son (commanding the 112th) appeared<br />
at the 106th Division command post and<br />
reported his situation, and the regiment<br />
w<strong>as</strong> taken over by General Jones—a so-<br />
lution subsequently approved by Gen-<br />
eral Middleton. Colonel Nelson brought<br />
a welcome addition to the St. Vith forces.<br />
His regiment had lost most of its vehi-<br />
cles, radios, and crew-served weapons<br />
but had suffered relatively light c<strong>as</strong>ual-<br />
ties and lost but few stragglers. It w<strong>as</strong><br />
well in the hand of its commander and<br />
ready to fight. Jones ordered the 112th<br />
Infantry to draw northward on the night<br />
of 19–20 December and make a firm con-<br />
nection with the southern flank of the<br />
424th.<br />
Throughout the 19th t<strong>here</strong> were spo-<br />
radic cl<strong>as</strong>hes with the enemy around the<br />
perimeter. The threatened sector re-<br />
mained the line from Poteau to St. Vith,<br />
and from St. Vith along the e<strong>as</strong>tern front<br />
covered by CCB, 7th Armored, and<br />
CCB, 9th Armored. At Poteau CCA<br />
brought more troops into and around<br />
the village, while the enemy fired in<br />
from the hill to the north rising along-<br />
side the Recht road. The southern col-<br />
umn of the 1st SS Panzer Division, which<br />
first had captured the town, w<strong>as</strong> long<br />
since gone, hurrying west. But the newly<br />
committed 9th SS Panzer Division, fol-<br />
lowing in its wake via Recht, threw a<br />
large detachment of panzer grenadiers<br />
into the woods around Poteau, either to<br />
retake the crossroad or to pin the<br />
Americans t<strong>here</strong>. The resulting state of<br />
affairs w<strong>as</strong> summed up when the execu-<br />
tive officer of CCA reported to the divi-<br />
sion G–3: “The CO of CCA wanted<br />
these facts made known. He is extended<br />
and cannot protect the right flank of the<br />
zone between Recht and Poteau. He<br />
cannot protect Poteau. He needed two<br />
companies of infantry deployed and one<br />
in reserve. He is getting infiltration in<br />
his rear from the vicinity of Recht. The<br />
woods are so thick that he needs almost<br />
an infantry platoon to protect three<br />
tanks sitting out t<strong>here</strong>. Dismounted in-<br />
fantry in foxholes control the intersec-<br />
tion at Poteau but [it is] covered by<br />
enemy fire.” Nevertheless the Poteau<br />
road junction w<strong>as</strong> denied the enemy, and<br />
by the close of day patrols had estab-<br />
lished contact between CCR, to the west,<br />
and CCA.<br />
At St. Vith enemy pressure failed to<br />
incre<strong>as</strong>e during the 19th, and the Amer-<br />
ican commanders took advantage of the<br />
breathing spell to re<strong>as</strong>sess their disposi-<br />
tions for defense. The two CCB com-<br />
manders, Clarke and Hoge, given a free<br />
hand by General Jones and General<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck, agreed that in the event of<br />
any future withdrawal CCB, 9th Ar-<br />
mored Division, might be trapped <strong>as</strong><br />
it then stood because Hoge’s combat<br />
command, deployed southe<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith,<br />
had no roads for a direct move west-<br />
ward and would be forced to retire<br />
through St. Vith. Clarke would hold <strong>as</strong><br />
long <strong>as</strong> possible e<strong>as</strong>t of the town, but<br />
with both combat commands in its<br />
streets St. Vith w<strong>as</strong> an obvious trap. It<br />
w<strong>as</strong> decided, t<strong>here</strong>fore, that Hoge should<br />
pull his command back during the com-<br />
ing night to a new line along the<br />
hills west of the railroad running out<br />
of St. Vith, thus conforming on its left<br />
with CCB, 7th Armored.<br />
The withdrawal w<strong>as</strong> carried out <strong>as</strong><br />
planned. A small German attack hit the<br />
right flank just <strong>as</strong> the move w<strong>as</strong> being
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 291<br />
made but w<strong>as</strong> checked by fire from the<br />
American tank guns and mortars. The<br />
armored infantry were now disposed in<br />
the center with the medium tank com-<br />
panies, which had circled through St.<br />
Vith, at either flank. The draw extend-<br />
ing from the south to the west edge of<br />
town served <strong>as</strong> a boundary between the<br />
two CCB’s. Because this piece of the<br />
front w<strong>as</strong> regarded by both commanders<br />
<strong>as</strong> potentially dangerous, a tank com-<br />
pany and a platoon of tank destroyers<br />
were placed to back up the troops at<br />
the junction point. As part of the re-<br />
organization on the 19th, CCB, 7th Ar-<br />
mored, took over the 17th Tank Bat-<br />
talion, which had been holding the road<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t of Recht. This fleshed out a<br />
more or less connected but thin line<br />
running <strong>as</strong> a semicircle from south of<br />
Recht to a point about a thousand yards<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith, then curving back to<br />
the southwest w<strong>here</strong> the 424th Infantry<br />
and CCB, 9th Armored, met near Gruf-<br />
flange.<br />
During the 19th the two CCB’s had<br />
been operating with very limited artil-<br />
lery support, although the 275th Ar-<br />
mored Field Artillery Battalion and the<br />
16th Armored Field Artillery Battalion<br />
had done yeoman service for their re-<br />
spective combat commands. The arrival<br />
of an additional field artillery battalion<br />
belonging to the 7th Armored and two<br />
155-mm. howitzer batteries of the 965th<br />
Field Artillery Battalion (the only corps<br />
artillery still in the sector) put more<br />
firepower at the disposal of the St. Vith<br />
defenders just at a time when the Ger-<br />
mans were bringing their guns into posi-<br />
tion e<strong>as</strong>t of town.<br />
Supply routes to the 7th Armored<br />
Division trains were still open, although<br />
menaced by the roving enemy and ob-<br />
structed by west-moving friendly traffic.<br />
Having set up installations west of La<br />
Roche, the trains’ commander (Col.<br />
Andrew J. Adams) used his own peo-<br />
ple and all the stragglers he could find<br />
to man roadblocks around the train area.<br />
About 1700 two German tanks and a rifle<br />
platoon suddenly struck at one of these<br />
positions south of La Roche manned by<br />
Company C, 129th Ordnance Main-<br />
tenance Battalion. The ordnance com-<br />
pany beat off the Germans, but the ap-<br />
pearance this far west of enemy troops<br />
(probably from the 116th Panzer Divi-<br />
sion) indicated that not only the 7th<br />
Armored Division trains but the entire<br />
division stood in danger of being cut<br />
off from the American force gathering<br />
around B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
At the forward command post of the<br />
7th Armored in Vielsalm, the Division<br />
G–4 (Lt. Col. Reginald H. Hodgson)<br />
sent a message back to Colonel Adams,<br />
depicting the view of the situation tak-<br />
en by the St. Vith commanders and their<br />
staffs <strong>as</strong> the 19th came to a close:<br />
All division units holding firm. Units to<br />
south have apparently been by-p<strong>as</strong>sed by<br />
some Boche. <strong>Army</strong> dump at Gouvy w<strong>as</strong><br />
abandoned by <strong>Army</strong> but D / 40th Tank Bat-<br />
talion took the town over. . . . 82 Parachut-<br />
ists (82d Airborne Division) now coming<br />
up so we can probably get some ammo. . . .<br />
I have no contact with Corps . . . but Corps<br />
h<strong>as</strong> ordered us to hold and situation well in<br />
hand. . . . Hope to see you soon: have sent<br />
you copy of all messages sent you. Hope you<br />
don’t think I’m crazy. CG w<strong>as</strong> well ple<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
with everything you have done. Congrats.<br />
Don’t move ’til you hear from me.<br />
The defense of the St. Vith–Vielsalm<br />
area had taken form by the night of 19<br />
December. The troops within the per-<br />
imeter occupied an “island” with a Ger-<br />
man tide rushing p<strong>as</strong>t on the north and
292 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
south and rising against its e<strong>as</strong>tern face.<br />
The liquidation of the Schnee Eifel<br />
pocket had freed the l<strong>as</strong>t elements of the<br />
LXVI Corps for use at St. Vith; General<br />
Lucht now could concentrate on the re-<br />
duction of that town.<br />
During the day the commanders of<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group B and the Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> joined General Lucht at the com-<br />
mand post of the 18th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division near Wallerode Mill. The<br />
LXVI Corps commander left this con-<br />
ference with orders to encircle St. Vith,<br />
putting his main weight in enveloping<br />
moves north and south of the town. Bad<br />
road conditions, the blown bridge at<br />
Steinebrück, and continued attempts by<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> columns to usurp the<br />
corps main supply road at Schönberg<br />
combined to delay Lucht’s concentra-<br />
tion. Lucht ordered a barrier erected at<br />
Schönberg to sift out the interlopers<br />
(Lucht and his chief of staff personally<br />
helped make arrests), but this w<strong>as</strong> of<br />
little <strong>as</strong>sistance. Corps and division artil-<br />
lery w<strong>as</strong> brought forward piece by piece<br />
whenever a break in a traffic jam oc-<br />
curred, but the appearance of these<br />
horse-drawn guns in the motorized col-<br />
umns only succeeded in further disrupt-<br />
ing the march order. Like the Americans<br />
on 17 December, jammed on the St.<br />
Vith–Vielsalm road, the Germans lacked<br />
adequate military police to handle the<br />
situation.<br />
Even so, by the evening of 19 De-<br />
cember the two infantry divisions of the<br />
LXVI Corps were in position to launch<br />
piecemeal attacks at or around St. Vith.<br />
The 18th Volks Grenadier Division, on<br />
the right, had fed the foot troops of its<br />
295th Regiment in between the Mobile<br />
Battalion, deployed around Wallerode,<br />
and the 294th, <strong>as</strong>tride the St. Vith-<br />
Schönberg road. The 293d Regiment,<br />
having aided in the capture of the<br />
Schnee Eifel regiments, filed into Schön-<br />
berg during the night. The division ar-<br />
tillery might be in firing position by the<br />
morning of the 20th. The 62d Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, to the south, finally<br />
brought its inner flank into echelon with<br />
the left of the 18th near Setz by pivoting<br />
the 190th Regiment west. The division<br />
left wing w<strong>as</strong> formed by the 164th Regi-<br />
ment, which had occupied Lommers-<br />
weiler and Hemmeres following the<br />
withdrawal of CCB, 9th Armored. The<br />
main body of the 183d remained in re-<br />
serve at Winterspelt. During the night of<br />
19–20 December the Germans com-<br />
pleted a division bridge at Steinebrück<br />
near that destroyed by the American<br />
armored engineers, and division artil-<br />
lery and heavy vehicles began their<br />
move north and west.<br />
The real punch in the forthcoming at-<br />
tack would be delivered by the tanks<br />
belonging to the Fuehrer Begleit Bri-<br />
gade. This armored brigade, com-<br />
manded by Col. Otto Remer, had been<br />
h<strong>as</strong>tily thrown together around a cadre<br />
composed of Hitler’s former headquar-<br />
ters guard. 8 When the Fuehrer’s com-<br />
mand post on the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front w<strong>as</strong><br />
closed by Hitler’s return to Berlin, in<br />
November, Remer w<strong>as</strong> given some addi-<br />
tional troops and shipped to the west.<br />
The final composition of the brigade w<strong>as</strong><br />
roughly equivalent to a reinforced Amer-<br />
ican combat command: three grenadier<br />
battalions, a battalion of Mark IV tanks<br />
from the Grossdeutschland Panzer Di-<br />
vision (a unit that caused Allied in-<br />
telligence no end of trouble since Gross-<br />
8 Remer had come to Hitler’s attention by his<br />
prompt actions designed to protect the Fuehrer<br />
during the July Putsch.
THE FIRST ATTACKS AT ST. VITH 293<br />
deutschland w<strong>as</strong> known to be on the<br />
E<strong>as</strong>tern Front), a battalion each of<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault and field guns, and eight batteries<br />
of flak which had formed the antiair-<br />
craft guard for Hitler. Despite repeated<br />
requests by General Lucht, this brigade<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not rele<strong>as</strong>ed to reinforce the LXVI<br />
Corps until late afternoon on 18 De-<br />
cember? Colonel Remer reached the<br />
corps headquarters that same night, but<br />
the movement of his complete brigade<br />
9 Manteuffel tells how he met Model on foot out-<br />
side St. Vith and persuaded the latter to commit<br />
Remer’s brigade so <strong>as</strong> to speed up the Sixth SS<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> and thus shake the Fifth loose. Freiden<br />
and Richardson, eds., The Fatal Decisions, Part 6.<br />
from Daun via Prüm to St. Vith would<br />
take considerable time. The orders he<br />
received from General Lucht were<br />
these: the Fuehrer Begleit Brigade<br />
would take part in the St. Vith attack<br />
but would not get too involved in the<br />
fight; once the town fell the brigade<br />
must drive posth<strong>as</strong>te for the Meuse<br />
River. After a personal reconnaissance<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith on 19 December Remer<br />
concluded that a frontal attack in this<br />
sector w<strong>as</strong> out of the question. He<br />
decided, t<strong>here</strong>fore, to flank the St. Vith<br />
defenses from the north <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> his<br />
brigade, scheduled to arrive on 20 De-<br />
cember, w<strong>as</strong> in hand.
CHAPTER XIII<br />
VIII Corps Attempts <strong>To</strong> Delay the Enemy<br />
CCR, 9th Armored Division, and<br />
the Road to B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
CCR, 9th Armored Division, the ar-<br />
mored reserve of the VIII Corps, had<br />
been stationed at Trois Vierges on 13<br />
December in position to support the<br />
corps left and center. It consisted of the<br />
52d Armored Infantry Battalion, 2d<br />
Tank Battalion, 73d Armored Field Ar-<br />
tillery Battalion, and the conventional<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force attachments. By the afternoon<br />
of 17 December German armored gains<br />
at the expense of the 28th Division,<br />
forming the center of the corps front,<br />
caused General Middleton to start gath-<br />
ering what antimechanized means he<br />
could find for commitment; this in-<br />
cluded the platoon of self-propelled tank<br />
destroyers from CCR which, <strong>as</strong> described<br />
earlier, he dispatched toward Clerf.<br />
When the second day of the battle<br />
came to a close, it had become apparent<br />
that the German columns advancing in<br />
the central sector were aiming at the<br />
road system leading to B<strong>as</strong>togne. De-<br />
layed reports from the 28th Division in-<br />
dicated that an enemy breakthrough<br />
w<strong>as</strong> imminent. The 9th Armored Divi-<br />
sion commander already had sent CCR<br />
south to Oberwampach, behind the 28th<br />
Division center, when General Middle-<br />
ton ordered the combat command to set<br />
up two strong roadblocks on the main<br />
paved road to B<strong>as</strong>togne “without delay.”<br />
This order came at 2140, ten minutes<br />
after word that the enemy had crossed<br />
the Clerf reached the VIII Corps com-<br />
mand post.<br />
The two roadblock positions selected<br />
by the corps commander lay on High-<br />
way N 12, which extended diagonally<br />
from St. Vith and the German border<br />
southwestward to B<strong>as</strong>togne. Both posi-<br />
tions were on the line which General<br />
Middleton would order held “at all<br />
costs.” Earlier, Middleton had directed<br />
the commander of the 106th Division to<br />
watch the northern entrance to this<br />
road, but the immediate threat on the<br />
night of the 17th w<strong>as</strong> that the mobile<br />
spearheads of the German attack would<br />
gain access to this road much closer to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. One of the blocking positions<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the intersection near the village of<br />
Lullange w<strong>here</strong> the hard-surfaced road<br />
from Clerf entered that leading to B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne. Clerf and its bridges were only<br />
five miles away from this junction and,<br />
on the evening of 17 December, already<br />
under German fire. The second position,<br />
three miles to the southwest on Highway<br />
N12 near the village of Allerborn,<br />
backed up the Lullange block. More<br />
important, the Allerborn road junction<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the point at which a continuation<br />
of Highway N12 turned off to the<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t and down into the Wiltz valley<br />
w<strong>here</strong> advance patrols of the main Ger-<br />
man forces, albeit still on the far bank
VIII CORPS ATTEMPTS TO DELAY THE ENEMY 295<br />
of the Clerf, had appeared. The Aller-<br />
born block w<strong>as</strong> only nine miles from<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
A little after midnight CCR had<br />
manned these two important positions,<br />
under orders to report to the VIII Corps<br />
command post the moment they were<br />
brought under <strong>as</strong>sault. <strong>Of</strong>f to the e<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
however, the 110th Infantry continued<br />
the unequal contest with an enemy<br />
whose strength w<strong>as</strong> growing by the hour.<br />
The force in the hands of the CCR com-<br />
mander, Col. Joseph H. Gilbreth, w<strong>as</strong><br />
small. Now split into two t<strong>as</strong>k forces and<br />
the supporting CCR headquarters<br />
group, the whole w<strong>as</strong> spread thin indeed.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Rose (Capt. L. K. Rose),<br />
at the northern roadblock, consisted<br />
of a company of Sherman tanks,<br />
one armored infantry company, and a<br />
platoon of armored engineers. The<br />
southern roadblock w<strong>as</strong> manned by T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Harper (Lt. Col. Ralph S. Har-<br />
per), which consisted of the 2d Tank<br />
Battalion (–) and two companies of the<br />
52d Armored Infantry Battalion.<br />
In midmorning the troops peering out<br />
from the ridge w<strong>here</strong> the northern road-<br />
block had been set up saw figures in<br />
field gray entering a patch of woods<br />
to the e<strong>as</strong>t on the Clerf road, the first in-<br />
dication that the enemy had broken<br />
through the Clerf defenses. These<br />
Germans belonged to the Reconnais-<br />
sance Battalion of Lauchert’s 2d Panzer<br />
Division, whose infantry elements at<br />
the moment were eradicating the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
American defenders in Clerf. Lauchert’s<br />
two tank battalions, unaffected by the<br />
small arms fire sweeping the Clerf<br />
streets, were close behind the armored<br />
cars and half-tracks of the advance guard.<br />
Two attempts by the Reconnaissance<br />
Battalion to feel out T<strong>as</strong>k Force Rose<br />
were beaten back with the help of a<br />
battery from the 73d Armored Field<br />
Artillery Battalion whose howitzers<br />
were close enough to give direct fire at<br />
both American roadblocks. About 1100<br />
the first Mark IV’s of the 2d Battalion,<br />
3d Panzer Regiment, appeared and un-<br />
der cover of an effective smoke screen<br />
advanced to within 800 yards of the<br />
Shermans belonging to Company A,<br />
2d Tank Battalion. The Germans dal-<br />
lied, probably waiting for the Panzer<br />
Battalion, which finally arrived in the<br />
early afternoon, then deployed on the<br />
left of the Mark IV’s. Taken under<br />
direct fire by the enemy tank guns, the<br />
American infantry withdrew in the<br />
direction of the southern roadblock<br />
and Rose’s tanks now were surrounded<br />
on three sides.<br />
Colonel Gilbreth, whose combat com-<br />
mand w<strong>as</strong> directly attached to VIII Corps<br />
and who w<strong>as</strong> charged with the defense<br />
of the entry to the B<strong>as</strong>togne highway,<br />
could not commit his tiny reserve with-<br />
out the approval of the corps command-<br />
er. A telephone message from Gilbreth<br />
to the VIII Corps command post, at<br />
1405, shows the dilemma in all tactical<br />
decisions made during these hours when<br />
a few troops, tanks, and tank destroyers<br />
represented the only forces available to<br />
back up the splintering American line.<br />
TF Rose . . . is <strong>as</strong> good <strong>as</strong> surrounded.<br />
. . . have counted 16 German tanks t<strong>here</strong>.<br />
. . . TF is being hit from 3 sides. Recom-<br />
ment that they fight their way out. They<br />
could use 2 platoons of A / 52d Armd Inf<br />
Bn [the l<strong>as</strong>t rifle reserve in CCR]–every-<br />
thing else is committed. . . . Did not com-<br />
mit any of the TDs, will wait until the<br />
over-all plan is known.. Plan to push TF<br />
Rose toward the other road block. If the<br />
decision is to stay, some units will be sent<br />
t<strong>here</strong> to help them out.
296 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
The corps commander refused to let<br />
Rose move; and even if adequate rein-<br />
forcement for T<strong>as</strong>k Force Rose had been<br />
at hand the hour w<strong>as</strong> too late. A flanking<br />
move had driven back the American<br />
howitzers, German <strong>as</strong>sault guns satu-<br />
rated the crest position with white phos-<br />
phorus, and when the Shermans pulled<br />
back to the rear slope the panzers<br />
simply ringed Rose’s company. CCR<br />
headquarters got the word at 1430 that<br />
the northern roadblock and its defend-<br />
ers had been overrun, but despite the<br />
loss of seven Shermans Company A con-<br />
tinued to hold. It had been forced back<br />
from the road junction, however, and<br />
the bulk of the 3d Panzer Regiment w<strong>as</strong><br />
moving out onto the B<strong>as</strong>togne highway.<br />
The early winter night gave the Amer-<br />
icans a chance. Captain Rose broke out<br />
cross-country with five tanks and his<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault gun platoon, rolling f<strong>as</strong>t with-<br />
out lights through little villages to-<br />
ward Houffalize, near which the detach-<br />
ment w<strong>as</strong> ambushed. A few vehicles and<br />
crews broke free and reached B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The southern roadblock came under<br />
German fire in the late afternoon, light<br />
enemy elements seeping p<strong>as</strong>t the be-<br />
leaguered block at the northern junc-<br />
tion. The Mark IV’s and Panthers ac-<br />
tually did not reach T<strong>as</strong>k Force Har-<br />
per until after dark. Sweeping the area<br />
with machine gun fire to clear out any<br />
infantry who might be protecting the<br />
American tanks, the panzers overran<br />
and destroyed two tank platoons of<br />
Company C, 2d Tank Battalion. Per-<br />
haps the weight of this night attack had<br />
caught the American tankers off guard:<br />
the enemy later reported that only three<br />
Shermans at the Allerborn block were<br />
able to maneuver into a fighting stance.<br />
The armored infantry, about 500 yards<br />
from the Shermans, had no better for-<br />
tune. The panzers set the American<br />
vehicles afire with tracer bullets, then<br />
picked out their targets silhouetted by<br />
the flames. During this action Colonel<br />
Harper w<strong>as</strong> killed. What w<strong>as</strong> left of<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Harper and stragglers from<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Rose headed west toward<br />
Longvilly, w<strong>here</strong> CCR headquarters had<br />
been set up.<br />
Longvilly, five and a half miles from<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne, w<strong>as</strong> the scene of considerable<br />
confusion. Stragglers were marching<br />
and riding through the village, and the<br />
location of the enemy w<strong>as</strong> uncertain, al-<br />
though rumor placed him on all sides.<br />
About 2000 an officer appeared at Gil-<br />
breth’s command post and, to the de-<br />
light of the CCR staff, reported that a<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force from the 10th Armored Divi-<br />
sion (Team Cherry) w<strong>as</strong> down the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne road. The t<strong>as</strong>k force command-<br />
er, Lt. Col. Henry T. Cherry, he then<br />
announced, had orders not to advance<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Longvilly. This word abrupt-<br />
ly altered the atmosp<strong>here</strong> in the com-<br />
mand post.<br />
Two armored field artillery battal-<br />
ions (the 73d and 58th) still were fir-<br />
ing from positions close to Longvilly,<br />
pouring shells onto the Allerborn road<br />
junction from which T<strong>as</strong>k Force Har-<br />
per had been driven. A handful of rifle-<br />
men from the 110th Infantry, including<br />
Company G which had been ordered to<br />
Clerf and the remnants of the 110th<br />
headquarters which had been driven<br />
out of Allerborn, were still in action.<br />
These troops, together with four tank<br />
destroyers from the 630th Tank De-<br />
stroyer Battalion (–), had formed a<br />
skirmish line. to protect the firing bat-<br />
teries of the 58th south of the village.<br />
Late in the evening firing w<strong>as</strong> heard
VIII CORPS ATTEMPTS TO DELAY THE ENEMY 297<br />
behind the CCR position. This came<br />
from Mageret, next on the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
road, w<strong>here</strong> German troops had infil-<br />
trated and cut off the fire direction cen-<br />
ter of the 73d Field Artillery Battalion.<br />
The firing batteries nevertheless con-<br />
tinued to shell the road e<strong>as</strong>t of Longvilly,<br />
tying in with the 58th Field Artillery<br />
Battalion. Both battalions were firing<br />
with shorter and shorter fuzes; by 2315<br />
the gunners were aiming at enemy in-<br />
fantry and vehicles only two hundred<br />
yards to the front. Somehow the batter-<br />
ies held on. A little before midnight<br />
Colonel Gilbreth ordered what w<strong>as</strong> left<br />
of CCR and its attached troops to begin<br />
a withdrawal via Mageret. A few vehi-<br />
cles made a run for it but were am-<br />
bushed by the Germans now in posses-<br />
sion of Mageret. When a disorderly<br />
vehicle column jammed the exit from<br />
Longvilly, Gilbreth saw that some order<br />
must be restored and stopped all move-<br />
ment until morning light. 1<br />
Under orders, the 73d Armored Field<br />
Artillery Battalion displaced westward,<br />
starting about 0400, one battery cover-<br />
ing another until the three were west of<br />
Longvilly firing against enemy seen to<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t, north, and south, but giving<br />
some cover for the CCR withdrawal. The<br />
58th Field Artillery Battalion and its<br />
scratch covering force were hit early in<br />
the morning by a mortar barrage, and<br />
very shortly two German half-tracks ap-<br />
peared through the half-light. These<br />
were bl<strong>as</strong>ted with shellfire but enemy in-<br />
fantry had wormed close in, under cover<br />
of the morning fog, and drove back the<br />
1 Gilbreth w<strong>as</strong> convinced that he must “freeze”<br />
the vehicles in place after he had talked to the<br />
commander of the 58th Field Artillery Battalion,<br />
who had witnessed such precipitate withdrawals<br />
during the North African campaign. Ltr, Col<br />
Joseph H. Gilbreth to author, 6 Sep 58.<br />
thin American line in front of the bat-<br />
teries. About 0800 the fog swirled away,<br />
disclosing a pair of enemy tanks almost<br />
on the howitzers. In a sudden exchange<br />
of fire the tanks were destroyed.<br />
About this time CCR started along the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne road, although a rear guard<br />
action continued in Longvilly until<br />
noon. The 58th Field Artillery Battal-<br />
ion, with cannoneers and drivers the<br />
only rifle protection, joined the move,<br />
Battery B forming a rear guard and<br />
firing point-blank at pursuing German<br />
armor. The head of the main column<br />
formed by CCR w<strong>as</strong> close to Mageret<br />
when, at a halt caused by a roadblock,<br />
hostile fire erupted on the flanks of the<br />
column. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no turning back, nor<br />
could the vehicles be extricated from the<br />
jam along the road. The melee l<strong>as</strong>ted<br />
for several hours. Company C of the<br />
482d Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion<br />
(Capt. Denny J. Lovio) used its mobile<br />
quadruple machine guns with effect,<br />
working “heroically,” <strong>as</strong> CCR later ac-<br />
knowledged, to hold the Germans at bay.<br />
The two batteries of the 58th Armored<br />
Field Artillery Battalion that had been<br />
able to bring off their self-propelled<br />
howitzers went into action, but the fog<br />
had thickened and observed fire w<strong>as</strong><br />
well-nigh impossible. At long l<strong>as</strong>t the<br />
dismounted and disorganized column<br />
w<strong>as</strong> brought into some order “by several<br />
unknown officers who . . . brought<br />
leadership and confidence to our troops.”<br />
(Map VI)<br />
In midafternoon CCR headquarters,<br />
the remnants of the 58th, and the strag-<br />
glers who had been accumulated in the<br />
Longvilly defense made their way<br />
around to the north of Mageret, thence<br />
to Foy, and finally to B<strong>as</strong>togne, this move<br />
being made under cover of fire laid down
298 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
by paratroopers from the 101st who<br />
seemed to materialize out of now<strong>here</strong>.<br />
The losses sustained by CCR cannot be<br />
accurately determined, for a part of those<br />
listed in the final December report were<br />
incurred later in the defense of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne. 2 The 58th Armored Field Ar-<br />
tillery Battalion had lost eight of its<br />
howitzers; the 73d Armored Field Artil-<br />
lery Battalion had lost four. That these<br />
battalions were self-propelled accounts<br />
for the fact that so many pieces, closely<br />
engaged <strong>as</strong> the batteries had been, were<br />
saved to fire another day.<br />
While the battle for the roadblocks<br />
and Longvilly w<strong>as</strong> going on, a third t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force from CCR (Lt. Col. Robert M.<br />
Booth) had been separately engaged. As<br />
a guard against tank attack from the<br />
north, the CCR commander sent Booth<br />
with the headquarters and headquarters<br />
company of the 52d Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion, plus a platoon from the 811th<br />
Tank Destroyer Battalion, and a platoon<br />
of light tanks to occupy the high ground<br />
north of the Allerborn-Longvilly section<br />
of the main highway. During the night of<br />
18–19 December Booth’s position re-<br />
ceived some enemy fire but did not come<br />
under direct <strong>as</strong>sault. Communications<br />
with CCR had broken down, however,<br />
and German tanks had been identified<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sing to the rear along the Bourcy<br />
road.<br />
Booth decided that the best chance of<br />
escaping encirclement lay in moving out<br />
to the northwest. At daylight on the<br />
19th the column started, picking up<br />
stragglers from the original roadblocks<br />
<strong>as</strong> it moved. The light tank platoon<br />
2 The total losses for December 1944 (which in-<br />
clude those sustained later in the defense of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne) are reported in the AAR <strong>as</strong> being about<br />
800 killed and missing; the 2d Tank Battalion<br />
lost 45 medium tanks and 14 light tanks.<br />
dropped off early in the march to fight a<br />
rear guard action against the enemy who<br />
w<strong>as</strong> closing in on the column and to pro-<br />
tect a number of half-tracks which had<br />
bogged down. Hard pressed and unable<br />
to disengage its vehicles, the rear guard<br />
finally escaped on foot. The main col-<br />
umn dodged and detoured in a series of<br />
small brushes with the Germans, who by<br />
this time seemed to be everyw<strong>here</strong>, until<br />
it reached Hardigny, three miles north-<br />
west of the starting point. German<br />
tanks and infantry were waiting <strong>here</strong>,<br />
and in the ensuing fight the column w<strong>as</strong><br />
sm<strong>as</strong>hed. About 225 officers and men es-<br />
caped into the nearby woods and after<br />
devious wanderings behind the German<br />
lines, some for <strong>as</strong> long <strong>as</strong> six days, finally<br />
reached B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The Advance of the XLVII<br />
Panzer Corps<br />
Luettwitz’ XLVII Panzer Corps w<strong>as</strong><br />
coming within striking distance of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne by the evening of 18 December.<br />
The 2d Panzer Division, particularly,<br />
had picked up speed on the north wing<br />
after the surprising delay at Clerf. Luett-<br />
witz’ mission remained <strong>as</strong> originally<br />
planned, that is, to cross the Meuse in<br />
the Namur sector, and the capture of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne remained incidental–although<br />
none the less important–to this goal.<br />
Having er<strong>as</strong>ed the two roadblocks<br />
defended by CCR, General Lauchert<br />
turned his 2d Panzer Division to the<br />
northwest so <strong>as</strong> to swing p<strong>as</strong>t the B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne road nexus and maintain the<br />
momentum of the westward drive. This<br />
maneuver w<strong>as</strong> according to plan for<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no intention to use the 2d Pan-<br />
zer Division in a coup de main at<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. Lauchert’s column followed
VIII CORPS ATTEM PTS TO DELAY THE ENEMY<br />
the remnants of T<strong>as</strong>k Force Harper<br />
from the Allerborn roadblock, then<br />
turned off the B<strong>as</strong>togne highway<br />
near the hamlet of Chifontaine and<br />
headed toward Bourcy and Noville. It<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the 2d Panzer tanks which T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Booth had heard rolling in its rear<br />
on the night of 18–19 December and<br />
with which its rear guard collided on the<br />
19th. Although T<strong>as</strong>k Force Booth and<br />
the Germans at first missed each other,<br />
the subsequent American attempt to<br />
circle around the northwest and thus<br />
attain B<strong>as</strong>togne threw Booth’s column<br />
straight into the German path. Lauch-<br />
ert’s advance guard had hit Noville but<br />
found it strongly held and w<strong>as</strong> forced to<br />
withdraw. As a result a strong detach-<br />
ment moved north to Hardigny, before<br />
a flanking attempt against the Noville<br />
garrison, and <strong>here</strong> encountered and cut<br />
to pieces Booth’s column.<br />
The American troops defending in<br />
and around Longvilly were given a<br />
period of grace by Lauchert’s decision to<br />
turn off on the Bourcy road. A second<br />
on-the-spot decision by another German<br />
commander added a few hours’ breath-<br />
ing space. Bayerlein’s Panzer Lehr<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> slowly climbing out of the<br />
Wiltz valley on the afternoon and<br />
evening of 18 December, en route to an<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembly point at Niederwampach. The<br />
division had met little resistance but the<br />
roads were poor (the corps commander<br />
had caviled against the zone <strong>as</strong>signed the<br />
Panzer Lehr even during the planning<br />
period), and march control w<strong>as</strong> further<br />
burdened by the fact that the 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division w<strong>as</strong> marching two of<br />
its rifle regiments toward the same <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembly area. Theoretically the mobile<br />
columns of Panzer Lehr now should have<br />
been ahead of the infantry division. In<br />
299<br />
fact the foot troops of the 26th were<br />
making nearly <strong>as</strong> much speed <strong>as</strong> the ar-<br />
mor. Horse-drawn artillery w<strong>as</strong> mixed<br />
up with armored vehicles, the roads had<br />
been pounded to sloughs, and the Ger-<br />
man timetable for advance in this sector<br />
had gone out the window.<br />
In the early evening Bayerlein him-<br />
self led the advance guard of the Panzer<br />
Lehr (four companies of the 902d Pan-<br />
zer Grenadier Regiment and some fif-<br />
teen tanks) into Niederwampach. On the<br />
march the advance guard had heard the<br />
sounds of battle and seen gunfire flaming<br />
to the north, “an impressive sight,”<br />
Bayerlein later recalled. This w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
2d Panzer Division destroying the Aller-<br />
born roadblock defense. Bayerlein had<br />
two choices at this point. He could direct<br />
his division south to the hard-surfaced<br />
road linking Br<strong>as</strong>, Marvie, and B<strong>as</strong>togne,<br />
or he could risk an unpaved and muddy<br />
side road via Benonchamps which would<br />
put the Panzer Lehr onto the main B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne highway at Mageret, three miles<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne. Bayerlein decided on<br />
the side road because it w<strong>as</strong> shorter and<br />
he believed that it probably w<strong>as</strong> un-<br />
guarded.<br />
A kampfgruppe (a dozen tanks, a bat-<br />
talion of armored infantry, and one<br />
battery) w<strong>as</strong> sent on to seize Mageret<br />
and arrived t<strong>here</strong> an hour or so before<br />
midnight. The Americans occupied the<br />
village, but only with a small detach-<br />
ment of the 158th Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion, which had been ordered in to<br />
block the road, and a few of the service<br />
troops belonging to CCR. Fighting <strong>here</strong><br />
continued sporadically for an hour or<br />
two <strong>as</strong> Americans and Germans stumbled<br />
upon each other in the dark. By 0100 on<br />
19 December the enemy had set up his<br />
own roadblock e<strong>as</strong>t of the village, for
300 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
about that time ambulances evacuating<br />
wounded from Longvilly were checked<br />
by bullet fire. 3 Thus far the Panzer Lehr<br />
advance guard had run into no serious<br />
trouble, but a friendly civilian reported<br />
that American tanks had gone through<br />
Mageret earlier, en route to Longvilly. 4<br />
These tanks belonged to Team Cherry<br />
from CCB of the 10th Armored Division.<br />
Team Cherry on the Longvilly Road<br />
On the evening of 18 December Team<br />
Cherry moved out of B<strong>as</strong>togne on the<br />
road to Longvilly. 5 Since he had the<br />
leading team in the CCB, 10th Armored,<br />
column, Cherry had been <strong>as</strong>signed this<br />
mission by Colonel Roberts because of<br />
the immediate and obvious enemy threat<br />
to the e<strong>as</strong>t. Cherry had Company A and<br />
two light tank platoons of his own 3d<br />
Tank Battalion, Company C of the 20th<br />
Armored Infantry Battalion, the 2d Pla-<br />
toon of Company D, 90th Cavalry Recon-<br />
naissance, and a few medics and armored<br />
engineers. His headquarters and head-<br />
3 Sgt. M. N. Shay w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC for or-<br />
ganizing a group of soldiers to man machine guns<br />
and defend the village. When the defenders at-<br />
tempted to break out, Sergeant Shay stayed behind<br />
to cover the withdrawal and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> killed.<br />
4 The German sources for the Longvilly fight<br />
are MSS # A–939 (Luettwitz); A–942 (Bayer-<br />
lein) ; and B–040 (Kokott) .<br />
5 he useful records of the early and confused<br />
American reaction e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne are for the<br />
most part those compiled in the combat inter-<br />
views, shortly after the event, with personnel of<br />
the 9th and 10th Armored Divisions. The journals<br />
of the 2d Tank Battalion, for example, were<br />
destroyed. Most units lost their records and then<br />
attempted to compile an AAR from memory. The<br />
interviews mentioned above have served <strong>as</strong> the<br />
b<strong>as</strong>is for the description of the Longvilly action in<br />
three publications: The Armored School, Armor<br />
at B<strong>as</strong>togne (1949); Marshall, B<strong>as</strong>togne: The Story<br />
of the First Eight Days; and Nichols, Impact: The<br />
Battle Story of the Tenth Armored Division.<br />
quarters company w<strong>as</strong> established in<br />
Neffe, just e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne; his<br />
trains, fortunately <strong>as</strong> it turned out,<br />
remained in B<strong>as</strong>togne. The VIII<br />
Corps commander had designated Long-<br />
villy <strong>as</strong> one of the three positions which<br />
CCB w<strong>as</strong> to hold at all costs. Cherry<br />
knew that CCR, 9th Armored Division,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> supposed to be around Longvilly,<br />
but beyond that he w<strong>as</strong> totally in the<br />
dark. Even the maps at hand were nearly<br />
useless. The I: 100,000 sheets were accu-<br />
rate enough for a road march but told<br />
little of the terrain w<strong>here</strong> the team would<br />
deploy.<br />
About 1900, after an uneventful move,<br />
1st Lt. Edward P. Hyduke, commanding<br />
the advance guard, reached the western<br />
edge of Longvilly. Seeing that the village<br />
w<strong>as</strong> jammed with vehicles, he halted on<br />
the road. An hour later Cherry and his<br />
S–3 arrived at the headquarters of CCR<br />
w<strong>here</strong> they learned that the situation w<strong>as</strong><br />
“vague.” CCR had no plans except to<br />
carry out the “hold at all costs” order,<br />
and at the moment its southern road-<br />
block had not yet been overrun. Cherry<br />
went back to B<strong>as</strong>togne to tell the CCB<br />
commander, 10th Armored Division,<br />
how things were going, leaving orders<br />
for the advance guard to scout and estab-<br />
lish a position just west of Longvilly<br />
while the main force (Capt. William F.<br />
Ryerson) closed up along the road with<br />
its head about a thousand yards west of<br />
the town. Hyduke’s reconnaissance in<br />
the meantime had convinced him that<br />
the main gap in the defenses around<br />
Longvilly w<strong>as</strong> in the south, and t<strong>here</strong> he<br />
stationed the cavalry platoon, four Sher-<br />
man tanks, and seven light tanks.<br />
Just before midnight Lieutenant Hy-<br />
duke learned that CCR intended to fall<br />
back toward B<strong>as</strong>togne (although, in fact,
VIII CORPS ATTEMPTS TO DELAY THE ENEMY 301<br />
the CCR commander later curtailed this<br />
move) and radioed Colonel Cherry to<br />
this effect. When Cherry got the message,<br />
about two hours later, he also learned<br />
that Mageret had been seized by the Ger-<br />
mans and that his headquarters at Neffe<br />
now w<strong>as</strong> cut off from the team at Long-<br />
villy. Team Hyduke w<strong>as</strong> in the process<br />
of shifting in the dark to cover Long-<br />
villy on the e<strong>as</strong>t, north, and south. Ryer-<br />
son had sent a half-track load of infantry<br />
to feel out the situation at Mageret,<br />
while independently CCR headquarters<br />
(9th Armored Division) had dispatched<br />
a self-propelled tank destroyer from its<br />
platoon of the 811th Tank Destroyer Bat-<br />
talion on the same mission. After appre-<br />
hensive and belated recognition the two<br />
crews agreed that the road through Mag-<br />
eret could be opened only by force. This<br />
word ultimately reached Cherry who<br />
sent back orders, received at 0830, that<br />
Ryerson should fight his way through<br />
Mageret while the erstwhile advance<br />
guard conducted a rear guard defense of<br />
Longvilly .<br />
During the night small German forces<br />
had tried, rather halfheartedly, to get in-<br />
to Longvilly or at le<strong>as</strong>t to pick off the<br />
weapons and vehicles crowded in the<br />
streets by the light of flares and search-<br />
lights directed on the town. As yet the<br />
German artillery and heavy mortars had<br />
not come forward in any number and<br />
Longvilly w<strong>as</strong> shelled only in desultory<br />
f<strong>as</strong>hion. The two right-wing regiments<br />
of the 26th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
were reoriented to the northwest in a<br />
move to reach the Noville-B<strong>as</strong>togne road<br />
and place the division in position for a<br />
flanking attack aimed at penetrating the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter from the north. On<br />
the extreme right the 77th Grenadier<br />
Regiment had bivouacked near Ober-<br />
wampach, its orders to advance at day-<br />
break through Longvilly and head for<br />
Foy. Its left neighbor, the 78th, w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
make the main effort, swinging around<br />
to the north of Mageret and attacking<br />
to gain the high ground beyond Luzery.<br />
This plan failed to recognize the lim-<br />
itations of physical stamina and supply.<br />
With the dawn, the two regimental com-<br />
manders reported that their troops must<br />
be rested and resupplied before the ad-<br />
vance could resume. Shortly after 1000<br />
the 77th w<strong>as</strong> ready to start its advance<br />
guard through Longvilly, believing that<br />
the town w<strong>as</strong> in German hands. In light<br />
of the way in which troops of the 26th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division, Panzer Lehr,<br />
and 2d Panzer Division had poured into<br />
the area e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne during the<br />
night, crossing and recrossing boundary<br />
lines which now existed mostly on paper,<br />
it is not surprising that General Kokott<br />
and his commanders were a little vague<br />
<strong>as</strong> to whose troops held Longvilly.<br />
The 77th w<strong>as</strong> close to the town, ad-<br />
vancing in route column when patrols<br />
suddenly signaled that the Americans<br />
were ahead. It w<strong>as</strong> too late to byp<strong>as</strong>s<br />
the town; so the German regimental<br />
commander h<strong>as</strong>tily organized an attack<br />
behind a screen of machine guns which<br />
he rushed forward, at the same time<br />
borrowing some tanks from the 2d Pan-<br />
zer Division for a turning movement<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t of Longvilly. The division<br />
commander, however, ordered the attack<br />
held up until it could be organized and<br />
supported, made arrangements with the<br />
Panzer Lehr Division to join by a thrust<br />
from the southwest, and hurried guns<br />
and Werfers up to aid the infantry. Gen-<br />
eral Luettwitz, the corps commander,<br />
also took a hand in the game, without<br />
reference to Kokott, by ordering the 78th
302 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Grenadier Regiment to turn back toward<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t in support of the 77th. When<br />
Kokott heard what had been done with<br />
his left regiment the 78th already w<strong>as</strong> on<br />
the road, and it took until early after-<br />
noon to get the regiment turned around<br />
and moving west. An hour or so after<br />
noon the reinforced 77th w<strong>as</strong> ready to<br />
jump off from the attack positions south,<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, and northe<strong>as</strong>t of Longvilly.<br />
By this time the bulk of CCR (9th<br />
Armored Division) and the m<strong>as</strong>s of<br />
stragglers who had attached themselves<br />
to CCR were jammed in an immobile<br />
crowd along the road to Mageret, but a<br />
few riflemen were still holed up in the<br />
houses at Longvilly and the third platoon<br />
of Company C, 811th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion, w<strong>as</strong> manfully working its guns<br />
to cover the rear of the CCR column.<br />
The main action, however, devolved on<br />
the tanks and armored infantry which<br />
Hyduke had shifted during the night to<br />
form a close perimeter at Longvilly.<br />
The first indication of the nearing<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong> a storm of Werfer and artil-<br />
lery shells. Then came the German tanks<br />
borrowed from the 2d Panzer Division,<br />
ramming forward from the north and<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. In the confused action which fol-<br />
lowed the American tankers conducted<br />
themselves so well that Lauchert later<br />
reported a “counterattack” from Long-<br />
villy against the 2d Panzer flank. But the<br />
Shermans and the American light tanks<br />
were not only outnumbered but out-<br />
gunned by the Panthers and the 88’s of<br />
a flak battalion. The foregone conclusion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> reached a little before 1400 when the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t of the light tanks, all that remained,<br />
were destroyed by their crews who found<br />
it impossible to maneuver into the clear.<br />
The armored infantry were forced to<br />
abandon their half-tracks. The same<br />
thing happened to the three tank de-<br />
stroyers. At le<strong>as</strong>t eight panzers had been<br />
destroyed in the melee, but Longvilly<br />
w<strong>as</strong> taken.<br />
Lieutenant Hyduke’s team, acting un-<br />
der orders to rejoin Captain Ryerson’s<br />
main party, threaded a way west on foot<br />
and in small groups through the broken<br />
and burning column now in the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
throes of dissolution, in the woods along<br />
the road, under a rain of shells and bul-<br />
lets. Ryerson’s team, which Colonel<br />
Cherry had instructed early in the morn-<br />
ing to withdraw to the west, had been<br />
hard put to reverse itself and negotiate<br />
the cluttered road leading to Mageret.<br />
The leading American tank had reached<br />
a road cut some three hundred yards e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Mageret when a hidden tank or anti-<br />
tank gun suddenly opened fire, put a<br />
round into the Sherman, and set it<br />
aflame. The road into Mageret w<strong>as</strong><br />
closed and all possibility of a d<strong>as</strong>h<br />
through the village ended.<br />
Protected somewhat by the banks<br />
rising on either side of the road the<br />
Americans spent the day trying to inch<br />
forward to the north and south of the<br />
village. Some of the gunners and infantry<br />
from the CCR (9th Armored Division)<br />
column attempted to take a hand in the<br />
fight and help push forward a bit, but<br />
constant and accurate shelling (probably<br />
from Panzer Lehr tanks which had been<br />
diverted northward from Benonchamps<br />
to aid the 26th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion) checked every move. At dark a<br />
small detachment from Ryerson’s team<br />
and CCR reached the houses on the edge<br />
of Mageret. The village w<strong>as</strong> held in some<br />
strength by detachments of the 26th<br />
Reconnaissance Battalion and Panzer<br />
Lehr. Ryerson had to report: “Having<br />
tough time. [The Germans] are shooting
VIII CORPS ATTEMPTS TO DELAY THE ENEMY 303<br />
flares and knocking out our vehicles with<br />
direct fire.” But the Americans held onto<br />
their little chunk of the village through<br />
the night.<br />
While the bulk of Team Cherry w<strong>as</strong><br />
engaged at Longvilly and Mageret, the<br />
team commander and his headquarters<br />
troops were having a fight of their own<br />
at Neffe, a mile and a quarter southwest<br />
of Mageret. Here, cut off from his main<br />
force, Colonel Cherry had waited<br />
through the small hours of 19 December<br />
with the comforting <strong>as</strong>surance that<br />
troops of the 101st Airborne Division<br />
were moving through B<strong>as</strong>togne and<br />
would debouch to the e<strong>as</strong>t sometime that<br />
day. At first light a detachment of tanks<br />
and infantry from the Panzer Lehr hit<br />
the Reconnaissance Platoon, 3d Tank<br />
Battalion, outposting the Neffe cross-<br />
roads. The platoon stopped one tank<br />
with a bazooka round, but then broke<br />
under heavy fire and headed down the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne road. One of the two American<br />
headquarters tanks in support of the<br />
roadblock got away, <strong>as</strong> did a handful of<br />
troopers, and fell back to Cherry’s com-<br />
mand post, a stone château three hun-<br />
dred yards to the south.<br />
The enemy took his time about follow-<br />
ing up, but just before noon moved in to<br />
clear the château. For four hours the 3d<br />
Tank Battalion command post group<br />
held on behind the heavy walls, working<br />
the automatic weapons lifted from its<br />
vehicles and checking every rush in a<br />
bl<strong>as</strong>t of bullets. Finally a few hardy Ger-<br />
mans made it, close enough at le<strong>as</strong>t to<br />
pitch incendiary grenades through the<br />
window. Fire, leaping through the<br />
rooms, closed this episode. Reinforce-<br />
ments, a platoon of the 501st Parachute<br />
Infantry, arrived just in time to take part<br />
in the withdrawal. But their appearance<br />
and the covering fire of other troops be-<br />
hind them jarred the Germans enough to<br />
allow Cherry and his men to break free.<br />
Before pulling out for Mont, the next<br />
village west, Colonel Cherry radioed the<br />
CCB commander this message: “We are<br />
pulling out. We’re not driven out but<br />
burned out.”<br />
Through the afternoon and evening of<br />
19 December Captain Ryerson and the<br />
little force clutching at the edge of Mag-<br />
eret waited for reinforcements to appear<br />
over the ridges to the south, for CCB<br />
had radioed that help (from the 101st<br />
Airborne Division) w<strong>as</strong> on the way.<br />
Finally, after midnight, new word came<br />
from CCB. Ryerson w<strong>as</strong> to withdraw<br />
northwest to Bizory at dawn and join the<br />
501st Parachute Infantry t<strong>here</strong>. A little<br />
after daybreak Team Ryerson took its re-<br />
maining vehicles, its wounded, and the<br />
stragglers who had paused to take part<br />
in the fight and pulled away from Mag-<br />
eret. Forty minutes across country and it<br />
entered the paratrooper lines. The total<br />
cost to Team Cherry of the engagements<br />
on 19 December had been 175 officers<br />
and men, one-quarter of the command.<br />
Materiel losses had included seventeen<br />
armored half-tracks and an equal num-<br />
ber of tanks. Team Cherry records fif-<br />
teen German tanks destroyed in this day<br />
of catch-<strong>as</strong>-catch-can fighting, a likely<br />
figure since the 2d Panzer Division<br />
counted eight of its own tanks knocked<br />
out in one spot north of Longvilly.<br />
The story <strong>here</strong> set down h<strong>as</strong> been one<br />
of mischance and confusion. But regard<br />
the manner in which CCR, 9th Armored<br />
Division, and Team Cherry altered the<br />
course of the German drive on B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Through the night of 18–19 December<br />
General Luettwitz hourly expected word<br />
that the advance guard of the XLVII
304<br />
Panzer Corps had reached B<strong>as</strong>togne and<br />
the road t<strong>here</strong> from north to Houffalize.<br />
This good news failed to arrive. While<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> true that the resistance in the sec-<br />
tor held by the American 110th Infantry<br />
had finally crumbled, the cost to the Ger-<br />
mans had been dear in men, matériel,<br />
and tactical disorganization, but most of<br />
all in time. Fatigue too w<strong>as</strong> beginning to<br />
tell. Yet Luettwitz had some re<strong>as</strong>on to<br />
expect, <strong>as</strong> he did, that the road to the<br />
west at l<strong>as</strong>t w<strong>as</strong> clear and that the lost<br />
momentum would shortly be restored.<br />
Instead, <strong>as</strong> the record shows, the XLVII<br />
Panzer Corps continued to encounter<br />
irritating delays, delays compounded by<br />
American resistance, fatigue among the<br />
attacking troops, disintegrating roads, a<br />
general loss of control on the part of the<br />
German commanders, and, most telling<br />
of all, a momentary thickening of the<br />
“fog of war.” On the right wing of the<br />
corps the fight waged at the Lullange<br />
road junction by T<strong>as</strong>k Force Rose<br />
cheated the 2d Panzer Division of vital<br />
daylight hours. More time w<strong>as</strong> lost in<br />
reducing the Allerborn roadblock, and<br />
Lauchert’s advance guard found itself on<br />
the Bourcy-Noville road in the middle of<br />
the night. It is not surprising that the<br />
.German advance w<strong>as</strong> cautious and fur-<br />
ther attack to the northwest delayed.<br />
The whole affair added up to several<br />
extra hours that allowed the American<br />
defenders at the Noville outpost of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne until midmorning on the 19th to<br />
get set.<br />
The story of events at Longvilly and<br />
on the Longvilly-Mageret road merits<br />
particular attention by the student of<br />
tactics. Here w<strong>as</strong> a confused and hetero-<br />
geneous force whose main concern on the<br />
night of 18–19 December and the follow-<br />
ing day w<strong>as</strong> to find a way out of the Ger-<br />
THE AR DENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
man trap whose jaws were in plain view.<br />
Further resistance by either CCR or<br />
Team Cherry w<strong>as</strong> intended strictly <strong>as</strong> a<br />
rear guard action. Yet the mere physical<br />
presence of these troops in the Longvilly<br />
area caused a confusion in German plans<br />
and a diversion of the German main<br />
effort on 19 December out of all pro-<br />
portion to the tactical strength or im-<br />
portance of the American units involved.<br />
The “discovery,” on the morning of 19<br />
December, that American troops were in<br />
and around Longvilly cost the 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division at le<strong>as</strong>t four hours<br />
of precious daylight, first in setting up<br />
an attack for the 77th Grenadier Reg-<br />
iment and then in straightening out the<br />
78th. As a result when night came the<br />
right wing of the 26th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> only a little over two miles<br />
beyond Longvilly, and the left, which<br />
had crossed to the north side of the B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne road in the late afternoon, reached<br />
Bizory too late for a full-scale daylight<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault.<br />
Although the main advance guard of<br />
the Panzer Lehr Division continued to<br />
the west on 19 December, w<strong>here</strong> it ran<br />
afoul of Cherry’s headquarters group at<br />
Neffe, a considerable part of the Panzer<br />
Lehr armored strength w<strong>as</strong> diverted<br />
north from Benonchamps to use its tank<br />
gun fire against the Americans seen along<br />
the road e<strong>as</strong>t of Mageret and later to<br />
attack that village. Troops of both the<br />
901st and 902d were thrown in to mop<br />
up the woods w<strong>here</strong> the CCR column<br />
attempted to make a stand and they did<br />
not complete this job until midafter-<br />
noon. So, although the Panzer Lehr<br />
elements had helped free the Longvilly-<br />
Mageret road for the belated advance<br />
by the 26th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
to the northwest, the Panzer Lehr ad-
VIII CORPS ATTEMPTS TO DELAY THE ENEMY 305<br />
vance west of B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>as</strong> not the full-<br />
bodied affair necessary at this critical<br />
moment. The sudden blow at B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
which the commander of the XLVII Pan-<br />
zer Corps had hoped to deliver failed to<br />
come off on 19 December. Some Amer-<br />
ican outposts had been driven in, but<br />
with such loss of time and uneconomical<br />
use of means that the remaining outposts<br />
in front of B<strong>as</strong>togne now were manned<br />
and ready.<br />
The 101st Airborne Division<br />
Moves Into B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
After the long, bitter battle in Hol-<br />
land the 82d and 101st Airborne Divi-<br />
sions lay in camp near Reims, resting,<br />
refitting, and preparing for the next air-<br />
borne operation. General Ridgway’s<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps, to which these<br />
divisions belonged, constituted the strate-<br />
gic reserve for the Allied forces in west-<br />
ern Europe. Although the Supreme<br />
Allied Commander had in the p<strong>as</strong>t<br />
attempted to create a SHAEF Reserve of<br />
a size commensurate with the expedition-<br />
ary forces under his command, he had<br />
been continually thwarted by the de-<br />
mands of a battle front extending from<br />
the North Sea to Switzerland. On 16<br />
December, t<strong>here</strong>fore, the SHAEF Re-<br />
serve consisted solely of the two airborne<br />
divisions in France.<br />
Less than thirty-six hours after the<br />
start of the German counteroffensive,<br />
General Hodges, seeing the VIII Corps<br />
center give way under m<strong>as</strong>sive blows and<br />
having thrown his own First <strong>Army</strong><br />
reserves into the fray plus whatever<br />
Simpson’s Ninth could spare, turned to<br />
Bradley with a request for the SHAEF<br />
Reserve. Eisenhower listened to Bradley<br />
and acceded, albeit reluctantly; the two<br />
airborne divisions would be sent imme-<br />
diately to the VIII Corps area. Orders<br />
for the move reached the chief of staff of<br />
the XVIII Airborne Corps during the<br />
early evening of 17 December and the<br />
latter promptly relayed the alert to the<br />
82d and 101st. T<strong>here</strong> seems to have been<br />
some delay in reaching the corps com-<br />
mander in England, w<strong>here</strong> he w<strong>as</strong> ob-<br />
serving the training of a new division<br />
(the 17th Airborne), but a couple of<br />
hours after midnight he too had his<br />
orders and began hurried preparations<br />
for the flight to France.<br />
The two divisions had little organic<br />
transportation-after all they were<br />
equipped to fly or parachute into battle-<br />
but in a matter of hours the Oise Section<br />
of the Communications Zone gat<strong>here</strong>d<br />
enough io-ton open trucks and trailers<br />
plus the work horse 2½-tonners to<br />
mount all the airborne infantry. Because<br />
the 82d had been given a little more rest<br />
than the 101st and would take less time<br />
to draw its battle gear and get on the<br />
road, it w<strong>as</strong> selected to lead the motor<br />
march into Belgium. Ridgway would be<br />
delayed for some hours; so General<br />
Gavin, commanding the 82d, <strong>as</strong>sumed<br />
the role of acting corps commander,<br />
setting out at once for the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
headquarters w<strong>here</strong> he arrived in mid-<br />
morning on the 18th. Since Maj. Gen.<br />
Maxwell D. Taylor w<strong>as</strong> on leave in the<br />
United States, Brig. Gen. Anthony C.<br />
McAuliffe, artillery commander of the<br />
101st, prepared to lead this division into<br />
battle.<br />
<strong>To</strong> alert and dispatch the two veteran<br />
airborne divisions w<strong>as</strong> a methodical busi-<br />
ness, although both moved to the front<br />
minus some equipment and with less<br />
than the prescribed load of ammunition.<br />
This initial deployment in Belgium pre-
306 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
sents a less ordered picture, blurred by<br />
the fact that headquarters journals fail<br />
to square with one another and the<br />
memories of the commanders involved<br />
are at variance, particularly <strong>as</strong> regards<br />
the critical decision (or decisions) which<br />
brought the 101st to B<strong>as</strong>togne and its<br />
encounter with history. 6<br />
General Middleton, the VIII Corps<br />
commander, had his headquarters in<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne when the storm broke in the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. The city quite literally commanded<br />
the highway system lacing the southern<br />
section of the Belgian Ardennes. Middle-<br />
ton, having done all he could on the 16th<br />
and 17th to <strong>as</strong>semble his meager reserve<br />
of tanks and engineers in l<strong>as</strong>t-ditch posi-<br />
tions on the roads entering B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
from the e<strong>as</strong>t, read the pattern of the<br />
enemy advance in these terms on the<br />
17th. The number of German divisions<br />
and the speed at which they were moving<br />
would require the acquisition of a much<br />
larger road net than the Germans had<br />
thus far used. If St. Vith held and the<br />
V Corps shoulder did not give way, the<br />
enemy would attempt to seize the excel-<br />
lent highway net at B<strong>as</strong>togne. Middle-<br />
ton t<strong>here</strong>fore planned to hold the orig-<br />
inal VIII Corps positions <strong>as</strong> long <strong>as</strong><br />
possible (in accordance with orders from<br />
General Hodges) , and at the same time<br />
to build strong defenses in front of St.<br />
Vith, Houffalize, B<strong>as</strong>togne, and Luxem-<br />
bourg City.<br />
For the second stage of his plan he<br />
counted on prompt <strong>as</strong>sistance from the<br />
First and Third Armies to create the<br />
defenses for St. Vith and Luxembourg,<br />
6 Combat interviews; VIII Corps AAR and G–3<br />
Jnl; XVIII Airborne Corps AAR and G–3 Jnl;<br />
101st Airborne Div AAR and G–3 Jnl.<br />
GENERAL MCAULIFFE<br />
while the two airborne divisions-which<br />
Hodges had <strong>as</strong>sured him would be forth-<br />
coming-took over B<strong>as</strong>togne and Houff-<br />
alize. Middleton re<strong>as</strong>oned that a strong<br />
American concentration in the B<strong>as</strong>togne-<br />
Houffalize sector would force the enemy<br />
to come to him, and that in any c<strong>as</strong>e he<br />
would be in strength on the German<br />
flank and rear. At midnight on the 17th<br />
the VIII Corps commander had a tele-<br />
phone call from Hodges’ headquarters<br />
and heard the welcome word that he<br />
probably would get the 82d and 101st<br />
Airborne Divisions “immediately.”<br />
Middleton’s plan, it seemed, could be<br />
put in effect by the morning of the 19th.<br />
Eisenhower’s order to commit the two<br />
airborne divisions did not specify exactly<br />
how they would be employed. Bradley<br />
and Hodges were agreed that they would<br />
be thrown in to block the German spear-<br />
head columns, but Lt. Gen. Walter Be-<br />
dell Smith, the SHAEF chief of staff,
VIII CORPS ATTEMPTS TO DELAY THE ENEMY 307<br />
seems to have selected B<strong>as</strong>togne <strong>as</strong> the<br />
initial rendezvous point in Belgium<br />
without any knowledge of the First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> and VIII Corps plans. In any event<br />
Smith expected both of the airborne<br />
divisions to <strong>as</strong>semble around B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The subsequent order of events is<br />
rather uncertain. When Gavin reported<br />
at Spa on the morning of the 18th, he<br />
found the First <strong>Army</strong> staff gravely con-<br />
cerned by Peiper’s armored thrust to-<br />
ward Werbomont and he w<strong>as</strong> ordered<br />
to divert the incoming bad, then en route<br />
to B<strong>as</strong>togne, toward Werbomont. Initi-<br />
ally both Gavin and McAuliffe were un-<br />
der the impression that the 101st w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
go to Werbomont; actually McAuliffe<br />
started with his advance party to report<br />
to Gavin at that point but detoured with<br />
the intention of first getting Middleton’s<br />
view of the situation. Middleton, on the<br />
other hand, expected that the 82d Air-<br />
borne would be put in at Houffalize to<br />
seal the gap opening on the north flank<br />
of the VIII Corps. McAuliffe reached<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne about 1600.<br />
The VIII Corps roadblocks e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne had meanwhile begun to give<br />
way. Middleton got Bradley’s permission<br />
to divert the 101st to the defense of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne, w<strong>here</strong>upon Hodges turned the<br />
101st over to Middleton and ordered him<br />
to withdraw his corps headquarters from<br />
the threatened city. Middleton, however.<br />
remained with a few of his staff to brief<br />
Ridgway, who reached B<strong>as</strong>togne in the<br />
early evening, and to help McAuliffe<br />
make his initial dispositons, the latter<br />
selecting an <strong>as</strong>sembly area around<br />
Mande-St. Etienne, some four miles west<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne. The VIII Corps commander<br />
telephoned Bradley that he had ordered<br />
the 101st to defend B<strong>as</strong>togne, that t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> no longer a corps reserve, and that<br />
the 101st might be forced to fight it out<br />
alone.<br />
Turning the motor columns of the<br />
101st w<strong>as</strong> catch-<strong>as</strong>-catch-can. At the vil-<br />
lage of Herbomont two main roads ex-<br />
tend southe<strong>as</strong>t to B<strong>as</strong>togne and northe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Houffalize (en route to Werbomont) .<br />
When the leader of the 101st column,<br />
Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> L. Sherburne, Jr., reached<br />
Herbomont about 2000 he found two<br />
military police posts some two hundred<br />
yards apart, one busily engaged in direct-<br />
ing all airborne traffic to the northe<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
the other directing it to the southe<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
This confusion w<strong>as</strong> soon straightened<br />
out; the l<strong>as</strong>t trucks of the 82d roared<br />
away in the direction of Werbomont and<br />
Sherburne turned the head of the 101st<br />
column toward B<strong>as</strong>togne. The story now<br />
becomes that of the 101st Airborne Divi-<br />
sion and of those units which would join<br />
it in the fight to bar the way west through<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The 501st Parachute Infantry Regi-<br />
ment (Lt. Col. Julian J. Ewell) headed<br />
the 101st Division columns rolling into<br />
Belgium, followed by the 506th Para-<br />
chute Infantry (Col. Robert F. Sink),<br />
the 502d Parachute Infantry (Lt. Col.<br />
Steve A. Chappuis) , and the 327th Gli-<br />
der Infantry Regiment (Col. Joseph H.<br />
Harper) to which w<strong>as</strong> attached the 1st<br />
Battalion of the 401s Glider Infantry.<br />
(The 1st Battalion from the 401st is<br />
carried <strong>as</strong> the “3d Battalion” in the<br />
journals of the 327th and this designa-<br />
tion will be used throughout the narra-<br />
tive.)<br />
The division w<strong>as</strong> smaller than a con-<br />
ventional infantry division (it numbered<br />
805 officers and 11,035 men), but the<br />
organization into four regiments w<strong>as</strong><br />
better adapted to an all-round or four-<br />
sided defense than the triangular forma-
308 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
PARATROOPERS OF THE 101ST AIRBORNE MOVING UP TO BASTOGNE<br />
tion common to the regular division.<br />
The 101st had three battalions of light<br />
field pieces, the modified pack howitzer<br />
with a maximum effective range of about<br />
8,000 yards. In place of the medium ar-<br />
tillery battalions normally organic or<br />
attached to the infantry division, the air-<br />
borne carried one battalion of 105-mm.<br />
howitzers. Also the airborne division had<br />
no armor attached, w<strong>here</strong><strong>as</strong> in practice<br />
at le<strong>as</strong>t one tank battalion accompanied<br />
every regular division. The odd bits and<br />
pieces of armored, artillery, and tank<br />
destroyer units which were en route to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne or would be absorbed on the<br />
ground by the 101st would ultimately<br />
coalesce to provide a “balanced” combat<br />
force in the defense of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Three of these ancillary units retained<br />
their tactical identity throughout the<br />
fight at B<strong>as</strong>togne. The 705th Tank De-<br />
stroyer Battalion (Lt. Col. Clifford Tem-<br />
pleton) w<strong>as</strong> in Germany with the Ninth<br />
<strong>Army</strong> when it received orders on the<br />
evening of the 18th to go south to B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne. By the time the column reached<br />
the Ourthe River, German tanks were<br />
so close at hand that Templeton had to<br />
detour to the west. <strong>To</strong> protect his trains<br />
he dropped off two platoons to hold the<br />
Ortheuville bridge, one of those acci-<br />
dents of war which have fateful conse-
VIII CORPS ATTEMPTS TO DELAY THE ENEMY 309<br />
quences. On the night of the 19th the<br />
battalion reached B<strong>as</strong>togne. The 705th<br />
w<strong>as</strong> equipped with the new self-pro-<br />
pelled long-barreled 76-mm. gun which<br />
would permit a duel on equal terms with<br />
most of the German tank guns.<br />
The 755th Armored Field Artillery<br />
Battalion (Lt. Col. William F. Hartman)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> sent from Germany on the eve-<br />
ning of the 18th with equally vague<br />
orders to proceed to B<strong>as</strong>togne. The bat-<br />
talion reached its destination the follow-<br />
ing morning to find B<strong>as</strong>togne jammed<br />
with vehicles. Middleton ordered Colo-<br />
nel Hartman to keep his bulky prime<br />
movers and 155-mm. howitzers out of the<br />
city until, in the evening, some traffic<br />
order had been restored.<br />
The 969th Field Artillery Battalion<br />
(Lt. Col. Hubert D. Barnes), also<br />
equipped with medium howitzers,<br />
joined the B<strong>as</strong>togne defense more or less<br />
by chance. Originally <strong>as</strong>signed to sup-<br />
port the 28th Division artillery, the bat-<br />
talion had been ordered to displace west<br />
<strong>as</strong> the enemy broke into the open. Sent<br />
hither and yon by liaison officers who<br />
apparently knew no more of the situa-<br />
tion than did the cannoneers, the battal-<br />
ion w<strong>as</strong> moving out of the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
sector when orders came to emplace and<br />
fire by map on German troops along the<br />
road entering Noville from the north.<br />
Thus the 969th joined the B<strong>as</strong>togne bat-<br />
tle. Ordered by McAuliffe into the<br />
slowly forming perimeter, it took firing<br />
positions at Villeroux near the 755th<br />
and the 420th Armored Field Artillery<br />
Battalions. These three battalions to-<br />
gether would form a groupment firing<br />
from the west around the entire sweep<br />
of the B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter. 7<br />
The 101st move from Camp Mour-<br />
melon to B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>as</strong> made in rain and<br />
snow flurries; for the later serials most of<br />
the 107-mile trip w<strong>as</strong> in darkness. All<br />
parts of the column were forced to buck<br />
the m<strong>as</strong>s of vehicles streaming back to<br />
the west. But the move w<strong>as</strong> made in good<br />
time, the 501st in the van taking only<br />
eight hours before it detrucked at mid-<br />
night. By 0900 on 19 December McAu-<br />
liffe had all four regiments in hand.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> could be no prolonged pause<br />
for an integrated division deployment,<br />
for all through the night messages of<br />
apprehension, defeat, and dis<strong>as</strong>ter-<br />
none too precise-came into B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Middleton counted on CCB of the 10th<br />
Armored Division (Col. William<br />
Roberts) to heal the breach–for a time<br />
at le<strong>as</strong>t-opened on the main road e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne. He expected McAuliffe to<br />
support this force, but <strong>as</strong> yet the enemy<br />
dispositions and intentions were too un-<br />
certain to permit any wholesale commit-<br />
ment of the 101st.<br />
7 The 705th Tank Destroyer Battalion AAR,<br />
755th Armored Field Artillery Battalion Unit His-<br />
tory, and 969th Field Artillery Battalion AAR are<br />
must reading for anyone attempting to reconstruct<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne defense.
CHAPTER XIV<br />
The VIII Corps Barrier Lines<br />
On the morning of 16 December Gen-<br />
eral Middleton’s VIII Corps had a for-<br />
mal corps reserve consisting of one<br />
armored combat command and four<br />
engineer combat battalions. In dire cir-<br />
cumstances Middleton might count on<br />
three additional engineer combat battal-<br />
ions which, under First <strong>Army</strong> command,<br />
were engaged <strong>as</strong> the 1128th Engineer<br />
Group in direct support of the normal<br />
engineer operations on foot in the VIII<br />
Corps area. In exceptionally adverse<br />
circumstances, that is under conditions<br />
then so remote <strong>as</strong> to be hardly worth a<br />
thought, the VIII Corps would have a<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t combat residue-poorly armed and<br />
ill-trained for combat-made up of rear<br />
echelon headquarters, supply, and tech-<br />
nical service troops, plus the increment<br />
of stragglers who might, in the course of<br />
battle, stray back from the front lines.<br />
General Middleton would be called up-<br />
on to use all of these “reserves.” Their<br />
total effect in the fight to delay the Ger-<br />
man forces hammering through the VIII<br />
Corps center would be extremely im-<br />
portant but at the same time generally<br />
incalculable, nor would many of these<br />
troops enter the pages of history. 1<br />
1 The author h<strong>as</strong> made an exhaustive (and ex-<br />
hausting) effort to read all the documents, jour-<br />
nals, and reports belonging to each of the units<br />
mentioned-no matter how cursorily-in this chap-<br />
ter. <strong>Of</strong> course a great number of records were<br />
destroyed; this is particularly true of the artillery<br />
battalions. The journals of most of the engineer<br />
units are extant, but these vary greatly in value.<br />
A handful of ordnance mechanics<br />
manning a Sherman tank fresh from the<br />
repair shop are seen at a bridge. By their<br />
mere presence they check an enemy col-<br />
umn long enough for the bridge to be<br />
demolished. The tank and its crew dis-<br />
appear. They have affected the course of<br />
the Ardennes battle, even though min-<br />
utely, but history does not record from<br />
whence they came or whither they<br />
went. A signal officer checking his wire<br />
along a byroad encounters a German<br />
column; he wheels his jeep and races<br />
back to alert a section of tank destroyers<br />
standing at a crossroad. Both he and the<br />
gunners are and remain anonymous. Yet<br />
the tank destroyers with a few shots rob<br />
the enemy of precious minutes, even<br />
hours. A platoon of engineers appears in<br />
one terse sentence of a German com-<br />
mander’s report. They have fought<br />
bravely, says the foe, and forced him to<br />
w<strong>as</strong>te a couple of hours in deployment<br />
and maneuver. In this brief emergence<br />
from the fog of war the engineer platoon<br />
Surprisingly, many of the ordnance and antiair-<br />
craft units provided records which helped con-<br />
siderably in unwinding the involved tactical<br />
situation in their particular area. Any reader<br />
wishing to delve further into the story should<br />
begin with the following records: the VIII Corps<br />
G–3 Journal and Artillery AAR; First U.S. <strong>Army</strong>,<br />
G–3 Journal; the 51st Engineer Combat Battalion<br />
S–3 Operations Journal (a model of what such a<br />
record should be); the very complete 158th En-<br />
gineer Combat Battalion S–3 Journal; and the<br />
brief but graphic AAR of the 58th Armored Field<br />
Artillery Battalion (whose records were destroyed) .
THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES 311<br />
makes its bid for recognition in history.<br />
That is all. A small group of stragglers<br />
suddenly become tired of what seems to<br />
be eternally retreating. Miles back they<br />
ce<strong>as</strong>ed to be part of an organized combat<br />
formation, and recorded history, at that<br />
point, lost them. The sound of firing is<br />
heard for fifteen minutes, an hour, com-<br />
ing from a patch of woods, a tiny village,<br />
the opposite side of a hill. The enemy<br />
h<strong>as</strong> been delayed; the enemy resumes<br />
the march westward. Weeks later a<br />
graves registration team uncovers mute<br />
evidence of a l<strong>as</strong>t-ditch stand at woods,<br />
village, or hill.<br />
The story of the units that were re-<br />
tained under tactical control and em-<br />
ployed directly by General Middleton<br />
in the attempt to form some defense in<br />
depth in the VIII Corps center h<strong>as</strong> been<br />
partially recorded and t<strong>here</strong>fore can be<br />
narrated. The effect that these units had<br />
in retarding the German advances, a<br />
course of action evolving extemporane-<br />
ously, must be considered along with<br />
the role played by the un-co-ordinated<br />
front-line formations in the haphazard<br />
sequence of their delaying actions from<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t to west. For convenience sake the<br />
VIII Corps action is recounted <strong>here</strong> in<br />
independent detail.<br />
With the very limited forces at his dis-<br />
posal prior to 16 December the VIII<br />
Corps commander found it physically<br />
impossible to erect any of the standard<br />
defenses taught in the higher army<br />
schools or prescribed in the field service<br />
regulations. The best he could do to de-<br />
fend the extended front w<strong>as</strong> to deploy<br />
his troops <strong>as</strong> a screen, retaining local<br />
reserves for local counterattack at poten-<br />
tially dangerous points. In effect, t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
fore, the main part of Middleton’s re-<br />
serve consisted of the battalions and<br />
companies <strong>as</strong>sembled in or close to the<br />
villages which formed the strongpoints<br />
of the screen. Under the circumstances<br />
t<strong>here</strong> could be no thought of an el<strong>as</strong>tic<br />
defense with strong formations eche-<br />
loned in any depth behind the forward<br />
positions. In the event of a general attack<br />
in great strength delivered against all<br />
parts of the corps front simultaneously,<br />
Middleton had little choice but to carry<br />
out the general directive to “defend in<br />
place.” With four engineer battalions<br />
and one small armored combat command<br />
<strong>as</strong> the only corps reserve behind an elon-<br />
gated and brittle linear defense Middle-<br />
ton’s commitment of this l<strong>as</strong>t reserve<br />
would turn on the attempt to plug a few<br />
of the gaps in the forward line, slow the<br />
enemy columns on a few main roads, and<br />
strengthen by human means two or three<br />
of the natural physical barriers deep in<br />
the corps rear area.<br />
Middleton’s First Moves<br />
During the daylight hours of 16 De-<br />
cember the direction of the German<br />
main effort and the weight of the forces<br />
involved w<strong>as</strong> only vaguely perceived by<br />
the VIII Corps and higher commands.<br />
In the front lines the troops actually<br />
grappling with the enemy initially re-<br />
ported piecemeal and seemingly local-<br />
ized attacks. As the day progressed and<br />
the attackers appeared in greater num-<br />
bers the changing situation duly w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
ported through the chain of command.<br />
By this time, however, communications<br />
had been so disrupted that the time lag<br />
<strong>as</strong> represented on the situation maps in<br />
corps and army headquarters w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
matter of several hours. As a result CCR,<br />
9th Armored Division, and the four en-<br />
gineer combat battalions received alert
312 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
orders and carried out <strong>as</strong>sembly, but<br />
only the 168th Engineer Combat Battal-<br />
ion w<strong>as</strong> committed and it had a string<br />
attached that restricted its free employ-<br />
ment by the 106th Infantry Division. <strong>Of</strong><br />
the three army engineer battalions in the<br />
VIII Corps zone under the 1128th En-<br />
gineer Group, one, the 299th Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion, already w<strong>as</strong> in the<br />
battle area. During the day its sawmills<br />
at Diekirch received a part in a First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> security plan, prepared a fortnight<br />
earlier. About one o’clock on the morn-<br />
ing of the 16th the 299th w<strong>as</strong> put on<br />
alert status with other units in the army<br />
rear area to meet expected landings of<br />
German paratroops. Through the first<br />
day of the counteroffensive, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
the 1128th had most of its men reinforc-<br />
ing the guards at rear area headquarters<br />
and installations or manning observation<br />
points.<br />
During the night of 16 December<br />
communications deteriorated still fur-<br />
ther, particularly from regimental com-<br />
mand posts forward. The outline of the<br />
German attack began to emerge, and the<br />
pattern tentatively pointed to Liège <strong>as</strong><br />
the enemy objective and made the size of<br />
the German effort more or less apparent.<br />
But the growing hiatus in time between<br />
the initial contact with enemy troops at<br />
a given point and the ultimate “fix” in<br />
gre<strong>as</strong>e pencil on the acetate overlays in<br />
the higher American headquarters made<br />
any true and timely picture of the extent<br />
of the German penetrations impossible.<br />
Enough information filtered into the<br />
VIII Corps command post at B<strong>as</strong>togne,<br />
nevertheless, to enable Middleton to<br />
formulate his countermoves. The defen-<br />
sive pIan he adopted consisted of two<br />
ph<strong>as</strong>es: first, to defend in place along the<br />
corps front <strong>as</strong> long <strong>as</strong> possible, thus<br />
carrying out the existing First <strong>Army</strong><br />
directive; second, to deny the enemy full<br />
and free use of the Ardennes road net<br />
by building the strongest possible de-<br />
fense, with the limited force at hand, in<br />
front of the key communications centers,<br />
St. Vith, Houffalize, B<strong>as</strong>togne, and Lux-<br />
embourg City. Although General Mid-<br />
dleton counted on reinforcements from<br />
outside his own command to garrison<br />
these four key points, it would fall to the<br />
VIII Corps to deny the enemy access<br />
t<strong>here</strong>to during the hours or days which<br />
would p<strong>as</strong>s before reinforcements could<br />
take over.<br />
St. Vith and B<strong>as</strong>togne appeared to be<br />
in the greatest immediate danger <strong>as</strong><br />
cracks commenced in the linear defense<br />
on the 17th. Friendly armor w<strong>as</strong> hurry-<br />
ing down from the north to bolster the<br />
106th Division and St. Vith; so, having<br />
turned one of his engineer battalions<br />
over to General Jones, the corps com-<br />
mander directed his attention to the ap-<br />
proaches to B<strong>as</strong>togne, a natural thing in<br />
view of the dangerous condition of the<br />
VIII Corps center. Thus a pattern w<strong>as</strong><br />
forming in which the meager resources<br />
at Middleton’s disposal would be com-<br />
mitted to delaying actions in the south-<br />
western part of the corps area while a<br />
vacuum formed south of St. Vith and to<br />
the rear of that sector. (See Map IV.)<br />
By the afternoon German advances at<br />
the expense of the 28th Division center<br />
forced Middleton to deploy the bulk of<br />
his reserve along the road net e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. The presence of enemy recon-<br />
naissance at the Clerf River indicated<br />
that the main crossings would be made<br />
near Clerf and Wilwerwiltz. From the<br />
Clerf bridgehead a main, hard-surfaced<br />
highway led into B<strong>as</strong>togne. The Wil-<br />
werwiltz bridgehead gave entry to the
THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES<br />
Wiltz valley and a complex of secondary<br />
roads wending toward B<strong>as</strong>togne. CCR,<br />
9th Armored (which earlier had sent<br />
some tank destroyers to Clerf) , drew the<br />
<strong>as</strong>signment of blocking the Clerf-B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne highway. One engineer battalion,<br />
the 44th, w<strong>as</strong> ordered to reinforce the<br />
headquarters force of the 707th Tank<br />
Battalion for the defense of Wilwerwiltz,<br />
but events were moving too f<strong>as</strong>t and the<br />
battalion w<strong>as</strong> diverted to the 28th Divi-<br />
sion command post at Wiltz. T<strong>here</strong> re-<br />
mained the problem of barring the way<br />
to Luxembourg City, e<strong>as</strong>t of which the<br />
4th Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong> having a hard<br />
time. Already in the area, the 159th En-<br />
gineer Combat Battalion w<strong>as</strong> attached to<br />
Barton’s division in the late afternoon<br />
and headed for Consdorf.<br />
<strong>Of</strong> what might be considered the for-<br />
mal reserve of the VIII Corps, General<br />
Middleton had left, by 1600 of 17 De-<br />
cember, only the 35th Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion; he retained in addition a<br />
partial voice in the disposition of the<br />
1148th Engineer Group. The corps en-<br />
gineer officer, meanwhile, had proposed<br />
1 plan for defending a line from Foy to<br />
Neffe which would screen the e<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
entries to B<strong>as</strong>togne. <strong>To</strong> form this screen<br />
the 35th and the 158th Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion, the latter taken from the<br />
1128th Group, <strong>as</strong>sembled their com-<br />
panies, vehicles, and equipment. Both<br />
battalions had been dispersed in num-<br />
erous working parties; their trucks were<br />
hauling road-building stores, timber,<br />
and the like. Weapons long in disuse had<br />
to be collected and checked; land mines<br />
and explosives had to be gat<strong>here</strong>d. Fur-<br />
thermore the 55th had the responsibility<br />
of guarding the VIII Corps headquarters<br />
and could not be rele<strong>as</strong>ed immediately.<br />
At the close of day other engineer<br />
313<br />
units were on the move. Ponton and<br />
light equipment companies pulled onto<br />
the roads leading west with orders to<br />
take their bridges, air compressors,<br />
graders, and other paraphernalia out<br />
of enemy reach. Some of these units, like<br />
the 626th Engineer Light Equipment<br />
Company, would find themselves di-<br />
rectly in the path of the German ad-<br />
vance. At Diekirch the 299th Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion, under orders to rejoin<br />
its group in the west, shut down the saw-<br />
mills and entrucked under artillery fire.<br />
As yet no large numbers of foot strag-<br />
glers had come from the front lines, but<br />
the roads to the rear were crowded with<br />
supply vehicles, medium and heavy ar-<br />
tillery, service and headquarters trucks,<br />
jeeps, and command cars. Around the<br />
headquarters and installations farther to<br />
the west, clerks, mechanics, truck driv-<br />
ers, and the like stripped the canv<strong>as</strong> from<br />
truck-mounted machine guns, filled the<br />
ammunition racks on deadlined tanks,<br />
listened to hurried explanations of ba-<br />
zooka mechanisms, or p<strong>as</strong>sed in inspec-<br />
tion before sergeants who for the first<br />
time in weeks were seriously concerned<br />
with the appearance of each carbine and<br />
pistol.<br />
At daylight on 18 December the 158th<br />
Engineer Combat Battalion commenced<br />
digging on its designated position north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne between Foy and Neffe.<br />
In addition barriers manned in platoon<br />
strength were set up at Neffe, Mageret,<br />
and Longvilly on the Clerf highway. By<br />
dint of borrowing right and left 950 anti-<br />
tank mines could be used to strengthen<br />
the 158th position. At Bizory, northwest<br />
of Mageret, a part of Company C, 9th<br />
Armored Engineer Battalion, had been<br />
loaned by CCR and during the morn-<br />
ing dug in on the high ground facing
314 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
toward the B<strong>as</strong>togne road.<br />
Help w<strong>as</strong> on the way to the VIII<br />
Corps, two airborne divisions and one<br />
armored. <strong>Of</strong> these reinforcements the<br />
101st Airborne Division and the 10th<br />
Armored Division were expected to <strong>as</strong>-<br />
semble in the neighborhood of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The problem then, during the 18th, w<strong>as</strong><br />
to extend the slim screen already in<br />
position e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne so <strong>as</strong> to provide<br />
cover north and south of the city against<br />
any enemy interruption of the <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
process. On the south side the 1102d En-<br />
gineer Group gat<strong>here</strong>d ordnance, quar-<br />
term<strong>as</strong>ter, signal, and engineer units,<br />
placing them e<strong>as</strong>t of the highway run-<br />
LA ROCHE AND THE OURTHE RIVER<br />
ning to Arlon. At the moment, however,<br />
this sector gave no cause for immediate<br />
concern, for the southern flank of the<br />
corps still w<strong>as</strong> holding.<br />
North of B<strong>as</strong>togne a German threat<br />
w<strong>as</strong> beginning to take shape. During the<br />
morning word reached the VIII Corps<br />
command post that the 740th Field Ar-<br />
tillery Battalion had been overrun by<br />
the 1st SS Panzer Division at Poteau,<br />
west of St. Vith. Also, the left wing of<br />
the 28th Infantry Division had been<br />
forced back across the Our River and it<br />
appeared that a penetration w<strong>as</strong> in prog-<br />
ress south of St. Vith. <strong>To</strong> head off any<br />
roaming German reconnaissance units
THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES<br />
north of B<strong>as</strong>togne, a collection of anti-<br />
aircraft, tank destroyer, ordnance, and<br />
engineer units moved to intersections<br />
and bridges along the B<strong>as</strong>togne-La<br />
Roche road. In the latter bridgehead<br />
town the 7th Armored Division trains<br />
took over responsibility for blocking the<br />
roads which t<strong>here</strong> united to cross the<br />
Ourthe River. E<strong>as</strong>t of this line lay HOUff-<br />
alize, one of the four key road centers<br />
designated by Middleton for defense,<br />
but the 82d Airborne Division w<strong>as</strong> en<br />
route to the battle and the VIII Corps<br />
commander expected that it would be<br />
deployed in the Houffalize sector. The<br />
Germans were moving too f<strong>as</strong>t. At 1400<br />
on the eighteenth a radio message<br />
reached B<strong>as</strong>togne that the enemy had<br />
overrun the rear command post of an<br />
engineer company at Steinbach, just e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Houffalize.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remained the very real threat<br />
of a coup de main against B<strong>as</strong>togne from<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t. In the afternoon bad news from<br />
this sector came thick and f<strong>as</strong>t: at 1405<br />
a telephone call from the commander<br />
of CCR, 9th Armored Division, reported<br />
that his most advanced roadblock force<br />
(T<strong>as</strong>k Force Rose) w<strong>as</strong> “<strong>as</strong> good <strong>as</strong> sur-<br />
rounded”; at 1430 the Germans were<br />
reported advancing on the second road-<br />
block; at 1525 came confirmation that<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Rose had been overrun. On<br />
the Clerf highway, then, the enemy w<strong>as</strong><br />
less than nine miles from B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Troops of the 28th Division continued<br />
to hold the town of Wiltz, but they could<br />
not bar the valley corridor to the Ger-<br />
mans. An officer patrol, in armored cars<br />
taken out of ordnance workshops, made<br />
an attempt to reconnoiter a proposed<br />
barrier line between CCR and Wiltz.<br />
<strong>To</strong>ward evening their report reached<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne: the Germans were west of the<br />
315<br />
proposed line. The project w<strong>as</strong> dropped.<br />
As ordered by General Hodges,<br />
most of the VIII Corps headquarters<br />
moved during the day to Neufchateau,<br />
about eighteen miles southwest of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne, but General Middleton and<br />
a small staff remained in the city to<br />
brief the incoming airborne and ar-<br />
mored commander and to maintain<br />
what little control still could be exer-<br />
cised over the course of battle. The 35th<br />
Engineer Combat Battalion, headquar-<br />
ters guard, w<strong>as</strong> more urgently needed<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne; at 1800 Middleton or-<br />
dered the battalion to move in on the<br />
right of the 158th. With two battalions<br />
in line t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a screen, albeit very<br />
thin, extending from the Houffalize-B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne road to the Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne road.<br />
Then, since the center of gravity for the<br />
corps w<strong>as</strong> rapidly shifting to the south-<br />
west, Middleton took his l<strong>as</strong>t two engi-<br />
neer battalions, the 1278th and 299th, to<br />
establish a screen facing generally north<br />
between Libramont and Martelange. Be-<br />
hind this screen, southwest of B<strong>as</strong>togne,<br />
he hoped to <strong>as</strong>semble the stragglers and<br />
broken units of his corps.<br />
The situation <strong>as</strong> seen by Middleton<br />
and his staff on the night of the 18th<br />
w<strong>as</strong> this. CCB of the 10th Armored had<br />
arrived from the Third <strong>Army</strong> and taken<br />
positions between B<strong>as</strong>togne and Wiltz.<br />
Some part of CCR, 9th Armored, re-<br />
mained intact at Longvilly <strong>as</strong>tride the<br />
Clerf road. The 101st Airborne Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> detrucking in its concentration area<br />
west of B<strong>as</strong>togne. The Germans had<br />
achieved a clear penetration in the corps<br />
center and for all practical purposes<br />
the American forces in the St. Vith sector<br />
were separated from those under Middle-<br />
ton’s immediate control. The deep and<br />
dangerous penetration made by the
316<br />
armored columns of the 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division in the V Corps sector north and<br />
west of St. Vith had forced the First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> and 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group command-<br />
ers to choose between an attempt to re-<br />
store the breach between B<strong>as</strong>togne and<br />
St. Vith and one to stop the 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division.<br />
The decision, made during the after-<br />
noon, w<strong>as</strong> to <strong>as</strong>semble the 82d airborne<br />
Division at Werbomont, instead of<br />
Houffalize <strong>as</strong> Middleton had intended.<br />
Houffalize would have to go and with-<br />
out a fight. Rumors in the early evening<br />
already placed it in German hands. Since<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no force at hand to close the<br />
Houffalize gap the most that could be<br />
done w<strong>as</strong> to vulcanize the edges of the<br />
tear by holding on at St. Vith and<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. Perhaps, too, the enemy rush-<br />
ing through the gap might be caused<br />
some difficulty and delay by the creation<br />
of a barrier line along the Ourthe River<br />
and its tributaries. Plans for such a<br />
barrier line already were in execution<br />
in heterogeneous units hurrying to out-<br />
post bridges, villages, and road inter-<br />
sections between La Roche and B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne.<br />
The night of 18 December w<strong>as</strong> rife<br />
with rumor. By the quarter hour new<br />
reports came in from excited truck<br />
drivers, jeep patrols, or lonely clerks on<br />
unfamiliar outpost duty, placing the Ger-<br />
mans in some village or on some road<br />
actuaIly well to the west of the real<br />
locations of the most advanced enemy<br />
spearheads. The rear are<strong>as</strong> of the corps<br />
-if one could continue to speak of any<br />
“rear” area–w<strong>as</strong> crawling with vehicles.<br />
Supply points, truckheads, and medical<br />
installations were moving to the west-<br />
some for the third time in <strong>as</strong> many days.<br />
New collecting points for the dead were<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
opening. And closer to the vague and<br />
fragmentary front line, roads, trails, and<br />
paths carried stragglers singly or in large<br />
herds, toiling painfully on foot or cling-<br />
ing tenaciously to some vehicle, back<br />
to B<strong>as</strong>togne or beyond to the west.<br />
The Cap North of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
The action e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne during<br />
the night of 18 December, the absorption<br />
of the engineer screen into the larger<br />
defending forces, and the final fate of<br />
CCR, 9th Armored, h<strong>as</strong> already been<br />
described. Here the focus is on the at-<br />
tempt to impede the probing advance<br />
guards and reconnaissance parties of the<br />
Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> pushing into the gap<br />
north of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Construction of a really tough bar-<br />
rier line along the Ourthe River hardly<br />
could be expected. The stream itself,<br />
even when swollen by the winter snows,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> narrow. At some points the ap-<br />
proaches to the crossing sites were diffi-<br />
cult to negotiate and lent themselves to<br />
blocks and barriers, but t<strong>here</strong> were many<br />
bridges and numerous fords which an<br />
enemy could use to byp<strong>as</strong>s a barred cross-<br />
ing site. At best only a very few compa-<br />
nies of engineers could be found for the<br />
business of preparing bridge demolition<br />
charges, erecting barriers, laying anti-<br />
tank mines, and bl<strong>as</strong>ting craters in the<br />
roads. Some engineer tools and equip-<br />
ment had been lost to the enemy, but<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> probably <strong>as</strong> much available<br />
<strong>as</strong> the small number of engineers could<br />
properly use. It w<strong>as</strong> one thing to<br />
strengthen the physical barriers in the<br />
path of the oncoming enemy; it w<strong>as</strong><br />
quite another to defend at these barriers<br />
with sufficient rifle strength and antitank<br />
weapons. The men and weapons re-
THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES 317<br />
quired for a continuous defensive line<br />
along the Ourthe simply were not avail-<br />
able. On the other hand the German col-<br />
umns would not hit the Ourthe line in a<br />
co-ordinated and general attack; further-<br />
more their initial appearance could be<br />
predicted along the well-defined and<br />
major routes westward.<br />
On the morning of 19 December re-<br />
connaissance troops of two German<br />
armored divisions, the 2d Panzer Divi-<br />
sion and the 116th Panzer Division, fun-<br />
neled through a narrow corridor, only<br />
two miles in width, between Noville and<br />
Houffalize. The southern wall of this<br />
corridor w<strong>as</strong> formed by the American<br />
troops who had pushed the rapidly form-<br />
ing B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter <strong>as</strong> far out <strong>as</strong><br />
Noville. In the-north w<strong>here</strong> the town<br />
of Houffalize had been abandoned the<br />
corridor wall w<strong>as</strong> formed by nature, for<br />
Houffalize w<strong>as</strong> a bridgehead on the e<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
west channel of the Ourthe River. The<br />
two corps whose armored divisions were<br />
leading the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> pack in<br />
the race for the Meuse were strung<br />
out for miles behind the foremost re-<br />
connaissance forces. The main forces of<br />
the two armored divisions, although rela-<br />
tively close to the reconnaissance teams,<br />
were still a few hours behind.<br />
On the German left the 2d Panzer Di-<br />
vision, leading the XL VII Panzer Corps,<br />
collided with the Noville defenses early<br />
on the 19th. Partly by chance and partly<br />
by design, for General Lauchert needed<br />
more road room in which to p<strong>as</strong>s his<br />
division around B<strong>as</strong>togne, the 2d Panzer<br />
Division column became involved in a<br />
fight which extended from Noville e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
to Longvilly and l<strong>as</strong>ted all through the<br />
day and following night. Caught up in<br />
this fight the advance elements of the<br />
division did not push beyond the<br />
Houffalize-B<strong>as</strong>togne road until darkness<br />
had fallen. On the German right the<br />
reconnaissance battalion of the 116th<br />
Panzer Division moved along the south<br />
side of the Ourthe swinging wide to<br />
avoid Houffalize (this before noon),<br />
then turning to the northwest with the<br />
intention of crossing the Ourthe and<br />
seizing the La Roche bridges from the<br />
rear. This advance, though unopposed,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> slow. Shortly after noon a few light<br />
reconnaissance vehicles reached Ber-<br />
togne, from which a secondary road led<br />
across the Ourthe and on to La Roche.<br />
General Middleton had spotted<br />
Bertogne <strong>as</strong> one of the chief approaches<br />
to the Ourthe and La Roche. Having<br />
been promised the 705th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion, en route south from the Ninth<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, he ordered the battalion to erect<br />
roadblocks at both Bertogne and La<br />
Roche. The 705th, coming by way of<br />
Liège, w<strong>as</strong> a few hours distant when the<br />
German scouts entered Bertogne. Across<br />
the river the commander of the 7th Ar-<br />
mored Division trains had taken inde-<br />
pendent action to protect his trucks and<br />
supplies gat<strong>here</strong>d in the neighborhood<br />
of La Roche by installing outpost detach-<br />
ments and roadblocks to the south and<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. Someone (who is not clear) had<br />
blown the Ourthe bridge northwest of<br />
Bertogne. <strong>To</strong> prevent the reconstruction<br />
of this bridge Colonel Adams sent Com-<br />
pany C, 129th Ordnance Maintenance<br />
Battalion, and a couple of antiaircraft<br />
half-tracks mounting 37-mm. guns to<br />
form a block on the near bank about a<br />
half mile from the village of Ortho.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> midafternoon when the enemy<br />
reached the far bank. A self-propelled<br />
gun at the head of the small German col-<br />
umn got in the first blow, its shells knock-<br />
ing out the half-track crews. Capt.
318 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Robert E. Spriggs withdrew his com-<br />
pany to a ridge overlooking the river<br />
and radioed for reinforcements. The<br />
enemy would not risk a daylight cross-<br />
ing, nor could the German engineers<br />
repair the damaged span while under<br />
direct fire. In the early evening five<br />
more half-tracks from the 203d Antiair-<br />
craft Battalion and a pair of self-pro-<br />
pelled tank destroyers from the 705th<br />
Tank Destroyer Battalion came up.<br />
It must have been about this time that<br />
the 116th Panzer Division command-<br />
er received the unwelcome news that<br />
he had no bridge on which to cross the<br />
western branch of the Ourthe. The<br />
forward combat teams of the division<br />
were west of the Houffalize-B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
road but not yet up to the river. They<br />
had defiled with difficulty on the limited<br />
road net north of the B<strong>as</strong>togne outworks,<br />
and a part of the tank regiment had<br />
stopped by the way to aid the 2d Panzer<br />
Division at Noville. In the twilight re-<br />
connaissance troops who had pushed<br />
west along the Ourthe after the setback<br />
at the Bertogne crossing discovered a<br />
Bailey bridge, still standing, at Ortheu-<br />
ville. Whether the bridge could be cap-<br />
tured in usable condition w<strong>as</strong> yet to be<br />
seen, but <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> this find w<strong>as</strong> radioed<br />
to the 116th Panzer Division command-<br />
er he directed the advance guard of the<br />
division toward Ortheuville.<br />
The Ourthe River resembles a mis-<br />
shapen Y in which the down stroke runs<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t to west and the open arms extend<br />
toward the northwest and southwest.<br />
The bifurcation in this Y comes about<br />
five miles west of Houffalize. The west<br />
branch of the Ourthe, <strong>as</strong> Belgian hydrog-<br />
raphers name it, w<strong>as</strong> the obstacle con-<br />
fronting the German armored spear-<br />
heads on the night of 19 December. All<br />
during that day engineers from the VIII<br />
Corps and First <strong>Army</strong> had toiled to<br />
make a barrier line of the two arms west<br />
of Houffalize, blowing bridges which<br />
were not on the main American supply<br />
lines, fixing charges for future destruc-<br />
tion of others, planting antitank mines<br />
at possible fording sites, erecting and<br />
manning roadblocks on roads and in the<br />
villages along the main approaches to<br />
the river. On the north branch, that is<br />
the line Durbuy-Hotton-La Roche, the<br />
51st Engineer Combat Battalion (Lt.<br />
Col. Harvey R. Fr<strong>as</strong>er) w<strong>as</strong> hard at<br />
work. 2 Only three companies were on<br />
hand to prepare this twelve-mile stretch<br />
of the river barrier, for Company C had<br />
been hurried northe<strong>as</strong>t to Trois Ponts<br />
w<strong>here</strong> it would administer a severe set-<br />
back to Kampfgruppe Peiper of the 1st<br />
SS Panzer Division. South of La Roche,<br />
whose important bridges were outposted<br />
by the 7th Armored trains, the 9th<br />
Canadian Forestry Company had left<br />
sawmills and logging tracts to prepare<br />
demolitions and guard the crossing sites<br />
on a tributary of the Ourthe. The steps<br />
taken to bar the western branch of<br />
the Ourthe northwest of Bertogne and<br />
the initial reverse imposed on the enemy<br />
reconnaissance t<strong>here</strong> have already been<br />
noted. Strung across the land neck be-<br />
tween La Roche and the bridgehead at<br />
Ortheuville were a few platoons of the<br />
1278th Engineer Combat Battalion.<br />
At Ortheuville one of the main VIII<br />
Corps supply roads (B<strong>as</strong>togne-Marche-<br />
Namur) crossed the western branch of<br />
3 The 51st held its main position for five days<br />
and w<strong>as</strong> given a Presidential Citation. The Ca-<br />
nadian Forestry Company which worked with the<br />
51st pays high tribute to the battalion and its<br />
commander. See No. 1 Coy, Canadian Forestry<br />
Corps, Report of Operations, 16–21 December<br />
1944.
THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES 319<br />
the river by means of a heavy Bailey<br />
bridge. Shortly after noon on the 19th<br />
a platoon or less of the 299th Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion arrived in Ortheuville<br />
to prepare this important span for de-<br />
struction. Although the VIII Corps staff<br />
had given priority to defense at this<br />
bridge, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little enough that<br />
could be put in the effort. Three com-<br />
panies of the 299th and a small portion<br />
of the 1278th Engineer Combat Battal-<br />
ions comprised all the troops available<br />
for a barrier line now being constructed<br />
from Martelange northwest along High-<br />
way N46 to the Ourthe River, thence<br />
on both banks of the river to Ortheu-<br />
ville–a distance of about twenty-seven<br />
miles.<br />
In the meantime the 158th Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion (Lt. Col. Sam Tabets)<br />
which, <strong>as</strong> part of the screen e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne, had been in a fire fight<br />
throughout the morning, 3 w<strong>as</strong> relieved<br />
by the 501st Parachute Infantry, the bat-<br />
talion leaving the sector about 1430. The<br />
companies of the 158th were returning<br />
to their separate and original bivouacs<br />
when corps orders suddenly arrived dis-<br />
patching the battalion to the Ourthe<br />
line. It would take some while to re<strong>as</strong>-<br />
semble the battalion but Company C w<strong>as</strong><br />
reached and diverted to Ortheuville.<br />
Here it closed about 1900. <strong>To</strong> his sur-<br />
prise and relief the engineer company<br />
commander found that he would have<br />
some antitank support-desultory shell-<br />
fire already w<strong>as</strong> falling on the village and<br />
3 When the first German <strong>as</strong>sault hit the 158th,<br />
Pvt. Bernard Michin took on an enemy tank with<br />
a bazooka at a range of ten yards, w<strong>as</strong> badly<br />
burned by the explosion but destroyed the tank.<br />
Unable to see because of his wounds he located<br />
an enemy machine gun by sound, threw a hand<br />
grenade, and wiped out the crew. He w<strong>as</strong> awarded<br />
the DSC.<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> known that German armor w<strong>as</strong><br />
close at hand. The 705th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion, which Middleton had attached<br />
to the 101st Airborne Division, w<strong>as</strong> on<br />
the move to B<strong>as</strong>togne. Originally ordered<br />
to use the road through Bertogne, the<br />
battalion had been forced to detour<br />
when the battalion commander found<br />
the enemy t<strong>here</strong>. The 705th, following<br />
the near bank of the Ourthe west to St.<br />
Hubert, dropped off eight tank destroy-<br />
ers to bar an enemy crossing while its<br />
trains p<strong>as</strong>sed through Ortheuville. These<br />
guns, <strong>as</strong> it turned out, would not reach<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne for a number of days.<br />
So things stood <strong>as</strong> the evening ad-<br />
vanced: the engineers and tank destroy-<br />
er crews waiting for some enemy move<br />
to take the bridge; the German self-<br />
propelled guns and tanks lobbing in a<br />
shell now and again to keep the Ameri-<br />
cans away from the bridge and perhaps<br />
with hopes of cutting the wires on the<br />
demolition charges. Back to the e<strong>as</strong>t the<br />
advance guard of the 116th Panzer Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> marching toward Ortheuville.<br />
At this point General Krueger, the<br />
L VIII Panzer Corps commander, made<br />
his fateful decision. The bridge north-<br />
west of Bertogne w<strong>as</strong> gone, the bridge<br />
at Ortheuville probably would be blown<br />
in any attack, and furthermore it would<br />
be difficult to squeeze the entire corps<br />
through the small opening between the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t-west channel of the Ourthe and<br />
Noville. Late in the evening he ordered<br />
the 116th Panzer Division advance<br />
guard, then at Salle three miles south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of the Ortheuville bridge, to a halt.<br />
Then he sent orders to the division com-<br />
manders and corps troops which would<br />
countermarch the forces west of the<br />
Houffalize-B<strong>as</strong>togne road and turn the<br />
entire LVIII Panzer Corps to the north,
320 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
through the Houffalize bridgehead, and<br />
away from the western branch of the<br />
Ourthe.<br />
A flurry of enemy activity a little be-<br />
fore midnight on the roads northwest<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne m<strong>as</strong>ked the withdrawal of<br />
the LVIII Panzer Corps. Armored cars<br />
and half-tracks raced up and down the<br />
roads shooting up small convoys, sparring<br />
with American outposts, and engender-<br />
ing a flock of rumors which placed<br />
German spearheads in a half dozen spots<br />
beyond the Ourthe. In truth the only<br />
serious efforts to cross the west branch<br />
in the late evening were those made by<br />
roving reconnaissance elements of the<br />
2d Panzer Division, whose main combat<br />
strength remained tied down in the fight<br />
for Noville. An hour before midnight<br />
these scouts did appear in front of a<br />
bridge at Sprimont, which crossed a<br />
tributary of the Ourthe south of Ortheu-<br />
ville; for their pains the American en-<br />
gineers blew the bridge in their faces.<br />
A few engineers, ordnance troops, and<br />
antiaircraft and tank destroyer crews on<br />
19 December had contributed mightily<br />
to the German decision which turned an<br />
entire armored corps from the road west<br />
and plunged it into profitless adventures<br />
in a side alley. <strong>Of</strong> all the disappoint-<br />
ments suffered by the Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> on this day, and t<strong>here</strong> were many,<br />
perhaps the greatest stemmed from the<br />
reverses suffered in fact at the bridge<br />
beyond Bertogne and in anticipation at<br />
the Bailey span in Ortheuville.<br />
While Krueger’s corps turned in its<br />
tracks during the night of 19 December,<br />
General Luettwitz issued commands to<br />
his XL VII Panzer Corps, whose forward<br />
column w<strong>as</strong> bunching up around<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. Reports from the troops press-<br />
ing onto the city from the north and<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t led Luettwitz to conclude that hard-<br />
hitting tactics in the coming day might<br />
break the will of the defenders, loosen<br />
their grip on the B<strong>as</strong>togne road net,<br />
and give the armor of the 2d Panzer<br />
Division and Panzer Lehr a clear high-<br />
way west. Luettwitz put a time limit on<br />
the attack prepared for the 20th, in-<br />
structing his armored divisions to be<br />
ready to byp<strong>as</strong>s B<strong>as</strong>togne. His recon-<br />
naissance pushed around the city, mean-<br />
while, both north and south, and tangled<br />
with the defenders of the makeshift,<br />
attenuated barrier lines.<br />
At Ortheuville a lull developed short-<br />
ly after midnight <strong>as</strong> the light armor<br />
screening the 116th Panzer Division final-<br />
ly pulled away. The engineers patrolled<br />
across the river along the B<strong>as</strong>togne road<br />
but found no one except American<br />
wounded whose trucks had been shot<br />
up by German raiders earlier in the<br />
night. Just before dawn, light tanks<br />
and armored infantry from the 2d Pan-<br />
zer Division arrived to take their turn<br />
at the bridge. After some time spent<br />
probing the bridge defenses by fire, the<br />
German infantry rushed forward behind<br />
a careening scout car. As much to their<br />
surprise <strong>as</strong> to that of the American<br />
engineers the bridge remained intact.<br />
For some re<strong>as</strong>on, perhaps the enemy<br />
shelling a few hours earlier, the demo-<br />
lition charges on the span failed to ex-<br />
plode when the plunger went home. At<br />
the first shock the defenders had fallen<br />
back across the bridge to the houses by<br />
the river bank and started firing. They<br />
had only a few minutes to wait before<br />
a column of German vehicles led by a<br />
light tank appeared on the opposite<br />
bank. When the leader started across<br />
the span, one of the two American tank<br />
destroyers which had been run down
THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES 321<br />
close to the bridge got a direct hit, thus<br />
blocking the span. Peculiarly enough<br />
the enemy made no further attempt to<br />
win a way across. In the afternoon, when<br />
the troops of the 158th and the 9th<br />
Canadian Forestry Company undertook<br />
a counterattack across the river they<br />
found no trace of the enemy. So confused<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the location of friend and foe that<br />
for a few hours two-way traffic between<br />
Marche and B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>as</strong> resumed.<br />
The capture of Noville during the<br />
afternoon freed the 2d Panzer Division<br />
to continue the advance toward the<br />
Meuse. On the other hand, Luettwitz’<br />
corps w<strong>as</strong> having trouble bringing g<strong>as</strong>oline<br />
forward on the crowded, winding<br />
supply roads in its sector; furthermore,<br />
the 2d Panzer Division would take some<br />
time to re<strong>as</strong>semble for the move on<br />
Marche. 4<br />
It remained for the division reconnaissance<br />
battalion, reinforced by artillery<br />
and engineers, to make the next<br />
foray against the Ortheuville crossing<br />
site. The reconnaissance troops got t<strong>here</strong><br />
about 2200. For two hours German<br />
howitzers, mortars, and machine guns<br />
pummeled the American defenses on the<br />
far bank, setting buildings aflame and<br />
tying the engineers and tank destroyers<br />
to their positions. At midnight the enemy<br />
infantry forded the river, attacking<br />
from out of the darkness against defenders<br />
whose movements were etched by<br />
the light of flares and burning houses.<br />
While those who had waded the river<br />
circled to the engineer flanks, more Ger-<br />
4 The difficulties which beset the 2d Panzer are<br />
well described in MSS # A–939 (Luettwitz) and<br />
B–456, 2d Panzer Division, 21–26 December 1944<br />
(Oberstleutnant Ruediger Weiz) and also in the<br />
Third U.S. <strong>Army</strong> interrogation of Lauchert.<br />
mans crossed into the village, this time<br />
by way of the bridge. Earlier the Ameri-<br />
cans had rewired demolition charges and<br />
installed the detonator in a foxhole close<br />
to the span, but for some re<strong>as</strong>on t<strong>here</strong><br />
again w<strong>as</strong> no explosion.<br />
The bridge defenders were in con-<br />
tact with the 1128th Engineer Group<br />
headquarters through the Belgian tele-<br />
phone system (which continued in oper-<br />
ation although its wire ran through the<br />
German lines). A request for infantry<br />
support could not be filled and the com-<br />
manding officer of the 1128th ordered<br />
the defenders to fall back southwest to<br />
St. Hubert. Most of the 158th Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion reached St. Hubert.<br />
As a parting gesture the tank destroyers,<br />
which had seen no tank targets, laid<br />
indirect fire on the bridge. A muffled<br />
explosion led the engineers to report<br />
that the span w<strong>as</strong> at le<strong>as</strong>t severely dam-<br />
aged.<br />
If so, the German engineers were<br />
quick to make repairs, for the advance<br />
guard of the 2d Panzer Division began<br />
to roll almost immediately on this and<br />
other temporary bridges thrown across<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Ortheuville. When daylight came<br />
the 2d Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong> bunched up<br />
in <strong>as</strong>sembly area with its head across<br />
the river near Tenneville and its rear<br />
guard, arrayed to meet a counterattack<br />
from B<strong>as</strong>togne, near Salle. Inexplicably,<br />
so far <strong>as</strong> the American patrols were con-<br />
cerned, the 2d Panzer Division did not<br />
bestir itself during the 21st to employ<br />
its victory at Ortheuville for a move on<br />
Marche, in which the advance regimental<br />
combat team of the 84th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembling. The answer <strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> logistical, not tactical: Lauchert’s<br />
armor would have to w<strong>as</strong>te the entire<br />
day waiting for g<strong>as</strong>oline.
322 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Defense Southwest of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
Throughout the 21st the VIII Corps<br />
had worked hard to strengthen the<br />
engineer barrier line in front of Neuf-<br />
château and Arlon, centers around which<br />
the corps w<strong>as</strong> re-forming, because the<br />
presence of German patrols south and<br />
southwest of B<strong>as</strong>togne gave ample warn-<br />
ing of imminent attack. Actually it is<br />
incorrect to consider these defenses in<br />
the sense of a line. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no contin-<br />
uous natural barrier on which to build.<br />
The defense of this sector, <strong>as</strong> a result,<br />
consisted of erecting obstacles at impor-<br />
tant road crossings, bridge demolitions,<br />
cratering concrete and macadam road<br />
surfaces, and mining fords and narrow<br />
stretches of roads. The troop detach-<br />
ments to cover these barriers remained<br />
small and heterogeneous, their weapons<br />
usually no more than carbines, rifles,<br />
machine guns, and bazook<strong>as</strong>. Heavy<br />
antitank weapons–a handful of tank de-<br />
stroyers, headquarters tanks, and how-<br />
itzers-would be found in ones and twos<br />
at the most important points. In general<br />
these defensive positions were organized<br />
with an eye to barring the roads which<br />
approached Neufchâteau ( (the VIII<br />
Corps headquarters) and Arlon (the<br />
western gateway to Luxembourg City)<br />
from the north.<br />
Strongpoints–the term is relative-<br />
had been created at St. Hubert, Libra-<br />
mont, Sibret, and Martelange, of which<br />
the l<strong>as</strong>t two were in the most imminent<br />
danger. Sibret, w<strong>here</strong> remnants of the<br />
28th Infantry Division had reorganized<br />
<strong>as</strong> T<strong>as</strong>k Force Caraway, lay only four<br />
miles southwest of B<strong>as</strong>togne. Martelange,<br />
on the highway to Arlon, w<strong>as</strong> thirteen<br />
miles due south of B<strong>as</strong>togne. Possession<br />
of this town w<strong>as</strong> of pressing importance.<br />
General Middleton <strong>as</strong>ked his troops, at<br />
1600, to hold the barrier line in front<br />
of Neufchâteau and Arlon for forty<br />
hours, or until help could come, and he<br />
specifically named Martelange. Here a<br />
branch of the Sure River provided a<br />
natural hindrance to troops advancing<br />
from the north; but <strong>here</strong> also an enemy<br />
penetration would endanger the <strong>as</strong>sem-<br />
bly of reinforcements coming up through<br />
Luxembourg and Arlon and would lay<br />
bare the right flank of the VIII Corps<br />
screen.<br />
At dusk a platoon from Company B,<br />
299th Engineer Combat Battalion,<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> holding Martelange, came<br />
under attack by tanks and infantry. The<br />
platoon blew the two bridges in the cen-<br />
ter of the town and withdrew. In great<br />
confusion the corps h<strong>as</strong>tily gat<strong>here</strong>d<br />
more engineers to defend the road to<br />
Arlon by a counterattack, but the Ger-<br />
mans remained quietly in the town and<br />
made no attempt to repair the bridges.<br />
An advance in force south on Arlon w<strong>as</strong><br />
no part of the XL VII Panzer Corps plan.<br />
The foray at Martelange had been made<br />
by column from the <strong>as</strong>sault gun bri-<br />
gade attached to the 5th Parachute Divi-<br />
sion, the division itself being strung out<br />
around Wiltz, which it had taken earlier.<br />
Poor communications, by this time <strong>as</strong><br />
baneful an influence on the operations<br />
of the XLVII Panzer Corps <strong>as</strong> on those<br />
of the American VIII Corps, gave the<br />
5th Parachute Division commander an<br />
extremely muddled picture of what had<br />
happened at Martelange. Heilmann did<br />
not know for sure who had the town<br />
until the next afternoon and in the<br />
interim became gravely worried about<br />
his exposed south flank, which at this<br />
moment w<strong>as</strong> the left anchor of both the<br />
corps and army. In a postwar account
THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES 323<br />
Heilmann concluded that in the Marte-<br />
lange action “quite a few things had gone<br />
wrong,” a conclusion which General<br />
Middleton could have shared.<br />
The next engagement in the new VIII<br />
Corps sector took place at Sibret. As<br />
the enemy closed on Wiltz General Cota<br />
had withdrawn the 28th Division com-<br />
mand post, setting it up in Sibret on<br />
the night of 19 December. A straggler<br />
line established around Neufchateau<br />
brought in some troops, and these were<br />
placed at roadblocks between B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
and Sibret. The 630th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion, having supported the 28th In-<br />
fantry Division from 16 December on,<br />
took station at a road junction south of<br />
Sibret. The battalion, be it said, con-<br />
sisted of parts of Company B and the<br />
headquarters–but without their guns.<br />
North and west of Sibret a number of<br />
artillery outfits belonging to the 333d<br />
Field Artillery Group and the 28th Di-<br />
vision had gone into firing positions<br />
from which to support the 101st Air-<br />
borne troops around B<strong>as</strong>togne. Some<br />
were intact, others were no more than<br />
headquarters batteries with a few pieces<br />
and a collection of cannoneers armed<br />
with rifles or carbines. Cavalry, tank, and<br />
tank destroyer units which had come<br />
back <strong>as</strong> the 28th Division center<br />
withdrew also were present with<br />
the artillery, but they too were<br />
remnants of battalion and company head-<br />
quarters with few men and few weapons.<br />
In Sibret General Cota had perhaps two<br />
hundred men, mostly stragglers and<br />
strangers, for his headquarters and serv-<br />
ice people had been organized <strong>as</strong> a pro-<br />
visional battalion and thrown in to help<br />
hold Wiltz. T<strong>here</strong> were three howitzers<br />
near the village, but the main antitank<br />
defense consisted of two bazook<strong>as</strong> which<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sistant division commander,<br />
Brig. Gen. George A. Davis; ordered<br />
held “in reserve.” Sibret, then, w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
“strongpoint” in the VIII Corps screen<br />
but could be so considered only in re-<br />
lation to the surrounding roadblocks<br />
manned by squads and sections.<br />
Renewed Drive Around B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
Around the e<strong>as</strong>tern arc of the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
perimeter the events of the 20th had<br />
convinced the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> that<br />
no more time should be w<strong>as</strong>ted <strong>here</strong><br />
and that the westward momentum of<br />
the XLVII Panzer Corps must be re-<br />
vived. The command solution to the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne problem called for the 2d Pan-<br />
zer Division to shake loose and hurry<br />
p<strong>as</strong>t the city in the north. This move,<br />
highlighted by the seizure of the Ortheu-<br />
ville bridge, began late on the 20th.<br />
Luettwitz divided the armor of the Pan-<br />
zer Lehr Division, one kampfgruppe to<br />
swing south of B<strong>as</strong>togne and on to the<br />
west, one to stay behind for a few hours<br />
and aid the 26th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion in reducing the city. The latter<br />
division would be left the unple<strong>as</strong>ant<br />
and difficult t<strong>as</strong>k (<strong>as</strong> General Kokott,<br />
the commander, saw it) of containing<br />
the American forces in and around the<br />
city while at the same time shifting the<br />
axis of attack from the e<strong>as</strong>t to the south<br />
and west.<br />
On the afternoon of the 20th General<br />
Kokott gave orders to set the first ph<strong>as</strong>e<br />
of this new plan in motion. The 39th<br />
Regiment, attacking on the south side<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne, w<strong>as</strong> told to continue across<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne-Martelange highway and<br />
capture the high ground in the vicinity<br />
of Assenois. The 26th Reconnaissance<br />
Battalion would <strong>as</strong>semble, p<strong>as</strong>s through
324 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the rifle regiment at dark, swing around<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne, and seize and hold the village<br />
of Senonchamps immediately west of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. From this point the battalion<br />
would lead an attack into the city. The<br />
26th’s commander had high hopes for<br />
this admittedly risky foray. The recon-<br />
naissance battalion w<strong>as</strong> in good condi-<br />
tion and its commander, Major Kunkel,<br />
had a reputation for daring. Kokott ex-<br />
pected the battalion to reach Senon-<br />
champs during the morning of the 21st.<br />
Through the dark hours General<br />
Kokott waited for some word from<br />
Kunkel’s kampfgruppe. At daybreak the<br />
first report arrived: the reconnaissance<br />
battalion w<strong>as</strong> in a hard fight at Sibret,<br />
two miles south of its objective. Next<br />
came an irate message from the corps<br />
commander: the 5th Parachute Division<br />
had captured Sibret and what w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
26th Reconnaissance Battalion doing<br />
hanging around that village? Kokott, his<br />
pride hurt, sent the division G–3 jolting<br />
uncomfortably on a half-track motor-<br />
cycle to find out what had gone wrong.<br />
From very sketchy German and Ameri-<br />
can sources the following broad outline<br />
of the fight for Sibret emerges. When<br />
Kunkel crossed the B<strong>as</strong>togne-Neufchâ-<br />
teau road, he came upon a stray rifle<br />
company of the 5th Parachute Division<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> engaged south of Sibret in a<br />
fire fight. About 0300 this German com-<br />
pany had reached the road junction at<br />
which the remnants of the 630th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion formed their road-<br />
block. The American gunners, fighting<br />
on foot with rifles, apparently delayed<br />
the Germans for a couple of hours. Then<br />
the rifle company and troopers from<br />
Kunkel’s command advanced through<br />
the dark to the south edge of Sibret,<br />
while German mortar fire started falling<br />
in the village. The first rush carried a<br />
group of the enemy into the solidly built<br />
gendarmerie at the southern entrance.<br />
Probably it w<strong>as</strong> this initial success which<br />
w<strong>as</strong> credited to the 5th Parachute Divi-<br />
sion.<br />
General Cota went through the streets<br />
rounding up all the troops he could find<br />
for a counterattack against the gen-<br />
darmerie, but the building could not<br />
be taken by unsupported riflemen. It<br />
w<strong>as</strong> well after daybreak now, but very<br />
foggy; the armored vehicles of the Ger-<br />
man battalion were closing on the vil-<br />
lage and it w<strong>as</strong> necessary to reoccupy the<br />
gendarmerie <strong>as</strong> a barrier. The three<br />
howitzers in the village defense had been<br />
overrun by tanks, but a battery of the<br />
771st Field Artillery Battalion remained<br />
emplaced some two thousand yards<br />
northwest of the village. After much<br />
maneuvering to attain a firing site w<strong>here</strong><br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no minimum elevation, the<br />
battery opened on the Germans bar-<br />
ricaded in the gendarmerie. At almost<br />
the same time the enemy started a very<br />
heavy shelling. It w<strong>as</strong> about 0900 and<br />
Kampfgruppe Kunkel w<strong>as</strong> well behind<br />
schedule. The garbled radio messages<br />
reaching the XLVII Panrer Corps re-<br />
tracted the early report that Sibret had<br />
been taken and told of heavy fighting<br />
in the “strongly garrisoned” village. But<br />
the Germans could not be shelled out<br />
of the gendarmerie, tanks moved in on<br />
the American battery, and General Cota<br />
ordered his small force to retire south<br />
to Vaux-lez-Rosikres; t<strong>here</strong> he set up<br />
his division command post.<br />
Meanwhile the staff of the 771st Field<br />
Artillery managed to get two guns into<br />
position to meet the enemy advance<br />
north of Sibret, but both guns and their<br />
tractors were put out of action by direct
THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES 325<br />
shelling. Kampfgruppe Kunkel rode<br />
roughshod into the artillery <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
are<strong>as</strong> north and west of Sibret, coming<br />
upon guns hooked to their prime movers,<br />
motors turning, and all the signs of<br />
hurried exodus. Kunkel reported the<br />
capture of more than a score of artillery<br />
pieces, much ammunition, and many<br />
prisoners. Quickly the kampfgruppe<br />
moved on Senonchamps, leaving only a<br />
small force to protect its left flank by a<br />
drive toward Chenogne.<br />
The 26th Reconnaissance Battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not alone west of B<strong>as</strong>togne. During<br />
the previous night the reconnaissance<br />
battalion of the Panzer Lehr Division<br />
had been relieved at Wardin, strength-<br />
ened by the attachment of the division<br />
engineer battalion, and started on a<br />
march around the south side of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
<strong>as</strong> advance guard in the resumption of<br />
the Panzer Lehr attack toward the<br />
Meuse. This Panzer Lehr t<strong>as</strong>k force had<br />
orders to scout in the direction of St.<br />
Hubert, the key to the road complex<br />
west of B<strong>as</strong>togne. Following the 26th<br />
Reconnaissance Battalion through Sib-<br />
ret, the Panzer Lehr column turned<br />
northwest and fanned out on the e<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
side of the Ourthe River in the neighbor-<br />
hood of Amberloup and Tillet. T<strong>here</strong><br />
were numerous fords and crossing sites<br />
along this stretch of the river, but the en-<br />
emy w<strong>as</strong> concerned with securing good<br />
roads and bridges for the heavy columns<br />
following.<br />
The approaches to St. Hubert were<br />
defended on the 21st by the 35th Engi-<br />
neer Combat Battalion (Lt. Col. Paul H.<br />
Symbol) , which had barricaded the<br />
northern entrance from Ortheuville and<br />
erected a strongpoint (held by Company<br />
C) at a crossroad in a loop of the Ourthe<br />
north of the village of Moircy. This<br />
latter defense barred the most direct line<br />
of march between B<strong>as</strong>togne and St.<br />
Hubert. A company of German infantry<br />
and four tanks appeared in front of the<br />
Company C abatis and foxholes before<br />
0900, but two of the tanks were rendered<br />
hors de combat by a bazooka team and<br />
the action turned into a small arms duel.<br />
For some re<strong>as</strong>on the attackers were not<br />
immediately reinforced, perhaps be-<br />
cause t<strong>here</strong> were other and more at-<br />
tractive targets in the vicinity. The 724th<br />
Engineer B<strong>as</strong>e Depot Company, earlier<br />
manhandling supplies in the depots at<br />
St. Hubert, marched in to thicken the<br />
American firing line, and by noon the<br />
fight had dwindled to an occ<strong>as</strong>ional ex-<br />
change of shots. During the lull of early<br />
afternoon the 158th Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion and the tank destroyers which<br />
had retreated from Ortheuville to St.<br />
Hubert were ordered south to take over<br />
the defense of Libramont. The 35th w<strong>as</strong><br />
left alone to blockade and delay a pos-<br />
sible thrust by the 2d Panzer Division<br />
forces now crossing at Ortheuville or<br />
the more direct threat from the e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
During the morning roving detach-<br />
ments of the Panzer Lehr t<strong>as</strong>k force had<br />
enjoyed a field day. For one thing they<br />
seized a large truck convoy, perhaps<br />
sixty to eighty vehicles, en route to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. They also surrounded the 58th<br />
Armored Field Artillery Battalion near<br />
Tillet, although no serious attempt w<strong>as</strong><br />
made to eradicate it. The bulk of the<br />
German t<strong>as</strong>k force crossed the Ourthe<br />
north of the Company C strongpoint but<br />
found that the American engineers had<br />
done a remarkably thorough job of<br />
blocking the roads leading to St. Hubert.<br />
Abatis (mined and booby-trapped) ,<br />
blown culverts, stretches corduroyed<br />
with felled trees, and extensive mine
326 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
COMBAT ENGINEER SETTING<br />
When the charge detonates, the tree will fall<br />
across the road to form part of a roadblock.<br />
A CHARGE.<br />
fields prompted reports to the Panzer<br />
Lehr Division commander that it would<br />
be some time before the e<strong>as</strong>tern and<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>tern approaches to St. Hubert<br />
could be cleared.<br />
In the late afternoon the Panzer Lehr<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force brought artillery into position<br />
and started shelling the Company C posi-<br />
tion. By this time the VIII Corps line<br />
no longer ran north and south in front<br />
of the German drive but w<strong>as</strong> forming<br />
from e<strong>as</strong>t to west with the enemy p<strong>as</strong>s-<br />
ing across the corps front. A single bat-<br />
talion of engineers and miscellaneous<br />
antiaircraft and depot troops could not<br />
be expected to hold what remained of<br />
the barrier line on the western branch<br />
of the Ourthe. Fearful lest the engineers<br />
be cut off, VIII Corps headquarters<br />
ordered the 35th to hold <strong>as</strong> long <strong>as</strong><br />
fe<strong>as</strong>ible, then rejoin the VIII Corps in<br />
the south. Using several hundred pounds<br />
of TNT which had arrived in the after-<br />
noon the engineers prepared demolitions<br />
to be blown coincident with the with-<br />
drawal through St. Hubert and Libra-<br />
mont. The enemy, hindered by darkness,<br />
mines, craters, and abatis, did not inter-<br />
fere with the engineers, and the latter<br />
fell back through Libramont, entrucked,<br />
and by midnight were in a new <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
area at Bouillon close to the French<br />
frontier.<br />
Somewhat earlier a German detach-<br />
ment had seized a bridge over the<br />
Ourthe at Moircy, to the south of the<br />
Company C strongpoints. This bridge<br />
gave access to a back road which entered<br />
St. Hubert from the southe<strong>as</strong>t. Despite<br />
the fact that this secondary route w<strong>as</strong><br />
relatively free from the craters and ob-<br />
stacles which cluttered the main roads,<br />
the Panzer Lehr t<strong>as</strong>k force made no<br />
move to strike for the town but instead<br />
spread out farther north. The 902d Regi-<br />
merit of the division had been relieved<br />
near Neffe during the evening of 21 De-<br />
cember and been <strong>as</strong>signed an advance<br />
via St. Hubert. The light armor of the<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force remained nearly immobile for<br />
the next twenty-four hours, and it w<strong>as</strong><br />
left to the main body of the division to<br />
utilize the Moircy road. 5<br />
With the withdrawal of the 35th<br />
Engineer Combat Battalion the VIII<br />
Corps no longer had elements directly<br />
in the path of the main German drive,<br />
always excepting, of course, the troops<br />
5 The Panzer Lehr commander w<strong>as</strong> well forward<br />
with his troops. For his recollections, which have<br />
proven to be excellent, see MSS # A–941 through<br />
A–943 (Bayerlein) .
THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES 327<br />
defending B<strong>as</strong>togne, which by this time<br />
were cut off from the rest of the corps.<br />
The outposts of the corps at Recogne<br />
(held by the 7th Tank Destroyer Group)<br />
and at Vaux-lez-Rosières (defended by<br />
a scratch force from the 28th Division,<br />
reinforced by the 527th Engineer Light<br />
Ponton Company) thus far had escaped<br />
the attention of an enemy moving west,<br />
not southwest. General Middleton w<strong>as</strong><br />
concerned about his open left flank and<br />
<strong>as</strong> his engineers came back ordered a<br />
barrier line formed along the Semois<br />
River. On the VIII Corps right, in the<br />
area south of B<strong>as</strong>togne, reinforcements<br />
from the Third <strong>Army</strong> were concentrat-<br />
ing under the command of the III Corps.<br />
The VIII Corps tactical air command<br />
post, which had been moved to Floren-<br />
ville on the 21st, continued to receive<br />
rumors and half-true reports of German<br />
forces turning southwest against its front,<br />
but it w<strong>as</strong> fairly clear that the main<br />
threat w<strong>as</strong> p<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
<strong>To</strong> meet the German forces scouting<br />
and probing along the corps sector<br />
General Middleton organized a counter-<br />
reconnaissance screen. Behind this were<br />
collected stragglers and strays, many of<br />
whom had crossed the French border<br />
and got <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Sedan. What w<strong>as</strong> left<br />
of the corps artillery, mainly the 402d<br />
Field Artillery Group, <strong>as</strong>sembled for<br />
tactical control and re-equipment. Other<br />
field artillery battalions, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> tank<br />
destroyer battalions, engineer regiments,<br />
and the like, were arriving to reinforce<br />
the corps and help make good its losses.<br />
New infantry formations were on the<br />
way to restore the striking power of the<br />
corps and the Third <strong>Army</strong> commander<br />
already w<strong>as</strong> planning the employment-<br />
on the offensive–of a revitalized VIII<br />
Corps.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remained one more battle to<br />
be fought by the residue of General<br />
Cota’s command, gat<strong>here</strong>d around the<br />
outpost position at Vaux-lez-Rosières on<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne-Neufchâteau road. During<br />
the night of 21 December some two<br />
hundred survivors of the 110th Infantry<br />
fight at Wiltz reached the 28th Division<br />
command post. Those who could be<br />
provided with clothes and weapons were<br />
put back into the line. Cota had in addi-<br />
tion the engineer light ponton company,<br />
retained <strong>as</strong> riflemen over the protests of<br />
the corps engineer, a few howitzers sited<br />
<strong>as</strong> single pieces around the village perim-<br />
eter, and a platoon of self-propelled<br />
76-mm. tank destroyers from the 602d<br />
Tank Destroyer Battalion, which had<br />
just come up from the Third <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
While the stragglers were being organ-<br />
ized, about 0800 on the 22d, German<br />
shells commenced to burst over the per-<br />
imeter. Enemy riflemen opened fire and<br />
an incautious light tank poked its nose<br />
into range of an American tank de-<br />
stroyer, which destroyed it. One prisoner<br />
w<strong>as</strong> taken before this first flurry ended, a<br />
rifleman from the 5th Parachute Divi-<br />
sion.<br />
The 5th Parachute Division, it will<br />
be recalled, had the mission of extend-<br />
ing westward the cordon which the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> to erect to forestall<br />
American counterattack against the<br />
south flank of the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
The terminus of this extension w<strong>as</strong> in-<br />
tended <strong>as</strong> the line Sibret–Vaux-lez-<br />
Rosières–Martelange, at which point the<br />
5th Parachute Division would go over<br />
to the defense. Colonel Heilmann’s<br />
troops had taken Martelange, the e<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
ern anchor for this .projected line, late<br />
on the 21st while small detachments re-<br />
connoitered to the west; it w<strong>as</strong> one of
328 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
these which briefly engaged the 28th<br />
Division (-) perimeter at Vaux-lez-<br />
Rosières.<br />
When the dispositions of the XLVII<br />
Panzer Corps around B<strong>as</strong>togne were al-<br />
tered on the 21st, Heilmann expected<br />
that his division would be given a more<br />
ambitious mission. For this re<strong>as</strong>on he<br />
ordered reconnaissance to be pushed<br />
south from Martelange and southwest<br />
toward Libramont on the 22d. That<br />
morning, however, a new corps com-<br />
mander, General der Kavallerie Edwin<br />
Graf von Rothkirch, arrived on the<br />
scene. He advised Heilmann to be “fore-<br />
sighted,” advice which the latter, draw-<br />
ing on his battle experience in Italy,<br />
interpreted <strong>as</strong> a warning to secure the<br />
original defensive line in preparation<br />
for imminent American counterattack.<br />
Sibret and Martelange were held by the<br />
5th Parachute; so Heilmann started his<br />
leading regiment, the 14th, for Vaux-lez-<br />
Rosières. It w<strong>as</strong> growing dark when the<br />
German advance guard appeared north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of the village.<br />
General Cota had placed his tank<br />
destroyers <strong>here</strong>, anticipating correctly<br />
the point of greatest danger, but this pre-<br />
caution w<strong>as</strong> useless. The enemy pushed<br />
to the fore a platoon of long-barreled<br />
88-mm. <strong>as</strong>sault guns mounted on an old<br />
model Tiger body with exceptionally<br />
heavy armor. The armor-piercing shells<br />
fired by the American 76-mm. guns had<br />
no effect whatever. The 28th Division<br />
headquarters fl<strong>as</strong>hed a radio warning to<br />
the VIII Corps command post, reported<br />
that it had five bazook<strong>as</strong> left, and af-<br />
firmed that these weapons could stop<br />
Tiger tanks, so much had the American<br />
infantryman’s respect for the bazooka<br />
grown in the trying days of the Ardennes.<br />
But the troops manning the perimeter<br />
were untrained engineers or men ex-<br />
hausted by constant battle and retreat,<br />
thrown again into a fight w<strong>here</strong> the odds<br />
were with the enemy and organized in<br />
pitifully small groups with strange<br />
officers and companions. Vaux-lez-<br />
Rosières fell to the Germans, and the<br />
28th Division command post moved once<br />
more, this time to Neufchâteau.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is a footnote to the events west<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne on 22 December–the story<br />
of the 58th Armored Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talion. This battalion, commanded by<br />
Lt. Col. Walter J. Paton, had taken part<br />
in the fight at Longvilly and the ensuing<br />
withdrawal to B<strong>as</strong>togne. With eight guns<br />
left the 58th went into position west<br />
of the town to fire for the 101st Airborne.<br />
On the afternoon of the 21st, with the<br />
enemy on the prowl in every direction,<br />
the battalion moved close to Tillet. Here<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> cut off by enemy reconnaissance<br />
units, and Colonel Paton ordered his<br />
drivers and gunners to dig a foxhole<br />
circle around guns and vehicles. Shortly<br />
after midnight a radio message came<br />
through: the battalion w<strong>as</strong> to try to<br />
reach B<strong>as</strong>togne. The column formed but<br />
had gone only a little way when the tank<br />
at its head w<strong>as</strong> knocked off by an anti-<br />
tank gun; then mortars and machine<br />
guns raked the road. Returning to the<br />
position which it had just left, the bat-<br />
talion waited for daylight.<br />
In the meantime strong forces of the<br />
Panzer Lehr Division were on the move<br />
west and troops were detached to wipe<br />
out this “strongpoint.” For most of the<br />
morning the encircled Americans stood<br />
to their guns or fought from their fox-<br />
holes. As one participant in the bitter<br />
fight phr<strong>as</strong>ed it, “We gave them every-
THE VIII CORPS BARRIER LINES 329<br />
thing we had and they gave it back just<br />
<strong>as</strong> f<strong>as</strong>t.” Only one of the eight self-<br />
propelled howitzers w<strong>as</strong> in firing condi-<br />
tion when Colonel Paton gave the order<br />
to destroy all equipment and make a<br />
break for it. Moving in little groups,<br />
shielded by trees and falling snow, most<br />
of the battalion succeeded in reaching<br />
the VIII Corps lines.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is a German peroration to this<br />
action. The commander of the Panzer<br />
Lehr Division recalling the route taken<br />
by his division <strong>as</strong> it marched toward St.<br />
Hubert drafts a detour showing the ad-<br />
vance guard swerving close to Tillet<br />
to engage an American “armored unit.”<br />
And late on the night of the 22d a gray-<br />
clad staff officer posting the situation<br />
map in the operations section of OKW<br />
makes a heavy pencil stroke. It is under<br />
the name Tillet.<br />
No accurate computation can be made<br />
of the hours added to the German march<br />
tables by the efforts of the engineers,<br />
artillery, and other small detachments<br />
who fought to delay the enemy advance<br />
through the rear are<strong>as</strong> of the VIII<br />
Corps. But t<strong>here</strong> is no question that the<br />
LVIII Panzer Corps w<strong>as</strong> diverted from<br />
the main stream of the western advance<br />
by these efforts–halving, for many hours,<br />
the spearhead strength of the Fifth Pan-<br />
zer <strong>Army</strong>. Students of the retrograde<br />
action fought by the VIII Corps be-<br />
tween 16 and 22 December will wish<br />
to examine the question <strong>as</strong> to the most<br />
profitable use of engineer troops who<br />
formed the backbone of the rear area<br />
defense in such circumstances. 6 The<br />
“magnificent job” which General Mid-<br />
dleton later <strong>as</strong>cribed to the engineers<br />
credits the engineers in their role <strong>as</strong><br />
infantry. The VIII Corps engineer and<br />
the various engineer group commanders<br />
at that time and later believed the<br />
engineer battalions and companies<br />
could have done more to impede the<br />
German advance if they had been denied<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>tern firing line and employed in<br />
a tactically unified second line of defense<br />
in the western part of the corps area.<br />
For this latter purpose General Middle-<br />
ton would have had some 3,300 engineers<br />
in addition to those organic in the divi-<br />
sions. But it is questionable whether the<br />
7th Armored Division would have had<br />
time to establish itself at St. Vith, not<br />
to speak of the 101st Airborne Division<br />
at B<strong>as</strong>togne, without the intervention of<br />
the engineer battalions. Nonetheless, the<br />
story of the Ardennes barrier lines does<br />
make clear that the use of engineers in<br />
their capacity <strong>as</strong> trained technicians of-<br />
ten paid greater dividends than their use<br />
<strong>as</strong> infantry, and that a squad equipped<br />
with sufficient TNT could, in the right<br />
spot, do more to slow the enemy advance<br />
than a company armed with rifles and<br />
machine guns.<br />
9 In theory both Americans and Germans recog-<br />
nized the need for proper employment of their<br />
technically trained engineer troops. Model, for<br />
example, put out an order on 18 December posi-<br />
tively forbidding the use of the German Pioneers<br />
<strong>as</strong> infantry. (LVIII Corps KTB, 18 Dec 44.) Doc-<br />
trine and tactical exigencies, however, often proved<br />
contradictory during the Ardennes battle.
CHAPTER XV<br />
The German Salient Expands to the West<br />
The reaction of rifle companies and<br />
battalions to the German surprise attack<br />
on the morning of 16 December w<strong>as</strong><br />
an automatic reflex to an immediate<br />
threat. The speed of reaction in higher<br />
American headquarters w<strong>as</strong> appreciably<br />
slower since the size of the enemy threat<br />
and its direction could be determined<br />
only when the bits and pieces of tactical<br />
information, <strong>as</strong>cending the command<br />
ladder echelon by echelon, began to ar-<br />
ray themselves in a credible manner.<br />
The fact that the German High Com-<br />
mand had chosen to make the main effort<br />
on the north flank contributed to an<br />
early misreading of the scope of the<br />
attack, for in this sector of the Allied<br />
line t<strong>here</strong> were two possible German<br />
military objectives which were tactically<br />
credible and compatible with the Allied<br />
preconception of a limited objective at-<br />
tack. These were, first, a spoiling opera-<br />
tion to neutralize the gains of the 2d<br />
and 99th Infantry Divisions in the ad-<br />
vance into the West Wall, and, second,<br />
a line-straightening operation to reduce<br />
the salient held by the 106th Infantry<br />
Division within the old West Wall posi-<br />
tions. Either or both of these interpre-<br />
tations of the initial German effort<br />
could be made and would be made at<br />
corps and higher headquarters during<br />
the 16th.<br />
The chain reaction during the early<br />
hours of the attack followed two paths,<br />
one via Gerow’s V Corps and the other<br />
via Middleton’s VIII Corps. The first<br />
report of enemy action on the 16th<br />
seems to have come to Gerow from the<br />
102d Cavalry Group in the Monschau<br />
sector. The second report reaching V<br />
Corps w<strong>as</strong> initiated by the 393d Infan-<br />
try and w<strong>as</strong> circumstantial enough to in-<br />
dicate a German penetration on the<br />
front of the 99th Division. By noon<br />
Gerow had sufficient information to jus-<br />
tify a corps order halting the attack be-<br />
ing made by the 2d and 99th. Although<br />
the First <strong>Army</strong> commander subse-<br />
quently disapproved Gerow’s action and<br />
ordered a resumption of the advance<br />
for 17 December, the American attack<br />
in fact w<strong>as</strong> halted, thus permitting a<br />
rapid redeployment to meet the German<br />
thrust. Gerow’s decision seems to have<br />
been taken before V Corps had any cer-<br />
tain word from the 394th Infantry on<br />
the corps right flank. Neither Gerow<br />
nor Middleton w<strong>as</strong> given prompt in-<br />
formation that contact between the 99th<br />
Division and the 14th Cavalry Group<br />
had been broken at the V-VIII Corps<br />
boundary.<br />
Since Middleton’s corps had been<br />
hit on a much wider front than in the<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e of its northern neighbor, a some-<br />
what better initial appreciation of the<br />
weight of the attack w<strong>as</strong> possible. Even<br />
so, Middleton and his superiors had too<br />
little precise information during most
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 331<br />
of the 16th to <strong>as</strong>sess the German threat<br />
properly. Middleton seems to have felt<br />
intuitively that his thinly held corps<br />
front w<strong>as</strong> being hammered by some-<br />
thing more serious than local and<br />
limited counterattacks. By 1030 he had<br />
convinced General Hodges that CCB,<br />
9th Armored Division, should be taken<br />
out of army reserve and turned over to<br />
the VIII Corps, for he had no armor in<br />
reserve behind the corps left flank.<br />
Shortly after noon telephone conversa-<br />
tions with his corps liaison officers at the<br />
106th headquarters in St. Vith convinced<br />
Middleton that he had to be ready to<br />
commit his own available corps reserves,<br />
four battalions of combat engineers and<br />
CCR, 9th Armored Division. By 1400<br />
the 168th Engineer Combat Battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembling at St. Vith and with-<br />
in the next few hours the remaining<br />
engineers and CCR were alerted and<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembled, the latter moving up<br />
behind the corps center w<strong>here</strong>, Middle-<br />
ton learned at 1415, all regiments of the<br />
28th Division were under attack.<br />
The sequence of events in the hours<br />
before midnight on the 16th is difficult<br />
to time. Middleton talked with the<br />
commander of the 106th Division by<br />
telephone and apparently believed that<br />
he, Middleton, had sanctioned a with-<br />
drawal of Jones’s exposed two regiments<br />
and that such a withdrawal would be<br />
made. 1 Impressed with the growing<br />
strength of the German attack, Middleton<br />
drafted a “hold at all costs” order which<br />
left his command post at 2120 and which<br />
set the final defense line generally along<br />
1 Intervs with Middleton and Capt L. B. Clarke,<br />
19 Jan 45 and 20 Apr 45; Ltr, Middleton to Col<br />
S. L. A. Marshall, 30 Jul 45.<br />
the west bank of the Our, Clerf, and<br />
Sure Rivers. General Bradley, whose<br />
12th <strong>Army</strong> Group headquarters in Lux-<br />
embourg City had a better telephone<br />
link to the VIII Corps than had the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> command post at Spa,<br />
talked with Middleton, then telephoned<br />
General Patton that the 10th Armored<br />
Division would have to come north to<br />
help Middleton’s corps. At midnight<br />
General Hodges ordered the 26th In-<br />
fantry attached to V Corps and set it<br />
marching for Camp Elsenborn. About<br />
the same time Hodges alerted part of<br />
the 3d Armored.<br />
It is unlikely that the responsible<br />
American commanders slept soundly on<br />
the night of the 16th, but <strong>as</strong> yet they<br />
had no real appreciation of the magni-<br />
tude of the enemy attack. The tactics<br />
followed by the Germans in the first<br />
hours had made it very difficult for even<br />
the front-line commanders to gauge the<br />
threat. The disruption of the forward<br />
communications nets by German shell-<br />
fire on the morning of the 16th had led<br />
to long periods of silence at the most<br />
endangered portions of the front and a<br />
subsequent overloading, with conse-<br />
quent delays, of those artillery radio net-<br />
works which continued to function. The<br />
initial enemy employment of small<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault groups, company-size or less, had<br />
led the combat commanders on the line<br />
to visualize and report a limited-scale<br />
attack. The broken and wooded nature<br />
of the terrain in the area under attack<br />
had permitted extensive German infil-<br />
tration without any American obser-<br />
vation, which also contributed to an<br />
erroneous first estimate of the enemy<br />
forces. Finally, the speed with which the<br />
American observation or listening posts<br />
were overrun and silenced had resulted
332 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
in large blank spaces on the G–2 maps<br />
in the American headquarters.<br />
At the close of this first day of bat-<br />
tle, t<strong>here</strong>fore, the only certain view of<br />
the enemy w<strong>as</strong> this: German forces<br />
were attacking all along the line from<br />
Monschau to Echternach; they had suc-<br />
ceeded in making some dents in the for-<br />
ward American positions; at a number<br />
of points the defenders seemed to need<br />
reinforcement; and the amount of Ger-<br />
man artillery which had been used w<strong>as</strong><br />
suspiciously large for only a limited ob-<br />
jective attack. During the night of 16<br />
December the German <strong>as</strong>sault waves<br />
overran or destroyed a large number of<br />
communications points and much radio<br />
or wire equipment in the forward are<strong>as</strong>,<br />
dr<strong>as</strong>tically slowing the flow of informa-<br />
tion to higher American headquarters.<br />
<strong>To</strong> many American units 17 Decem-<br />
ber opened <strong>as</strong> just another day. Com-<br />
pany B of the 341st Engineer General<br />
Service Regiment, for example, went<br />
that morning to work on a railroad<br />
bridge under construction at But-<br />
genbach. (Before noon the surprised<br />
engineers were shelled out.) As the<br />
morning progressed, however, the higher<br />
American headquarters began to com-<br />
prehend that the enemy w<strong>as</strong> making a<br />
full-scale attack and this with no limited<br />
objective in mind. By 0730 the V Corps<br />
commander had sufficient information<br />
to convince him that the enemy had<br />
broken through the lines of the 99th<br />
Division. At 0820 the VIII Corps artil-<br />
lery radio reported to Middleton that<br />
German troops were approaching St.<br />
Vith along the Schonberg road. Two<br />
hours later the American command nets<br />
were jammed with Allied air force re-<br />
ports of large enemy vehicular columns<br />
moving westward. Even more significant<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the fact that the fighter-bomber<br />
pilots were having to jettison their bomb<br />
loads in order to engage incre<strong>as</strong>ingly<br />
large flights of German planes.<br />
Two other key pieces helped fill out<br />
the puzzle picture of enemy forces and<br />
intentions. Prisoners had been taken<br />
from a number of units known to belong<br />
to the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, a formation<br />
long carried in Allied G–2 estimates<br />
<strong>as</strong> the German strategic reserve in<br />
the west. Second, some ninety Junker<br />
52's had been counted in the early morn-<br />
ing paratroop drop, an indication that<br />
the Germans had planned a serious air-<br />
borne <strong>as</strong>sault. By late morning of the<br />
17th, t<strong>here</strong>fore, it can be said that the<br />
American commanders had sufficient in-<br />
formation to construct and accept a pic-<br />
ture of a major Geramn offensive. It<br />
would take another thirty-six hours to<br />
produce a really accurate estimate of the<br />
number of German divisions m<strong>as</strong>sing on<br />
the Ardennes front.<br />
The 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group commander,<br />
General Bradley, had gone to Paris to<br />
discuss the replacement problem with<br />
General Eisenhower, when, on the after-<br />
noon of the 16th, a message from his<br />
own headquarters in Luxembourg City<br />
gave word of the German attack. Eisen-<br />
hower suggested that Bradley should<br />
move the 7th Armored Division down<br />
from the north and bring the 10th Ar-<br />
mored Division up from the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong>. The 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group had no<br />
strategic reserve, but plans already exist-<br />
ed to move troops in from Patton's<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> and Simpson's Ninth in the<br />
unlikely event that the undermanned<br />
VIII Corps front w<strong>as</strong> threatened. Brad-<br />
ley telephoned Patton and told him to<br />
send the 10th Armored Division north<br />
to help Middleton. Patton, <strong>as</strong> Bradley
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 333<br />
expected, demurred. His own army w<strong>as</strong><br />
readying for a major attack on 19 De-<br />
cember, an attack which had been the<br />
subject of controversy between Eisen-<br />
hower and Montgomery and which rep-<br />
resented the Third <strong>Army</strong>’s l<strong>as</strong>t chance<br />
to be the chief ball carrier in the Al-<br />
lied push to cross the Rhine. Bradley,<br />
however, w<strong>as</strong> firm and Patton at once<br />
gave the order to <strong>as</strong>semble the 10th<br />
Armored.<br />
Bradley’s second call went to Gen-<br />
eral Simpson whose grueling attack to<br />
close along the Rhine River had come<br />
to a halt on 14 December beside the<br />
muddy western banks of the Roer. Here<br />
the choice fell, <strong>as</strong> Eisenhower had sug-<br />
gested, on the 7th Armored Division,<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> resting and refitting in the<br />
rear of the XIII Corps zone. The 7th<br />
w<strong>as</strong> turned over to the First <strong>Army</strong> and<br />
now Bradley had a fresh armored di-<br />
vision moving in to shore up each of the<br />
endangered VIII Corps flanks. More<br />
troops, guns, and tanks would be moved<br />
out of Simpson’s army on 16 and 17<br />
December, but the authorization for<br />
these reinforcements is hard to trace.<br />
In many c<strong>as</strong>es the transfer of units would<br />
be accomplished in simple f<strong>as</strong>hion by<br />
telephone calls and simultaneous agree-<br />
ment between the higher commanders<br />
concerned. 2 Hodges and Simpson had<br />
2 The general story of the command decisions<br />
on the first days of the battle will b: found in<br />
Dwight D. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe (New<br />
York: Doubleday and Company, 1948); Omar N.<br />
Bradley, A Soldier’s Story (New York: Henry Holt<br />
and Company, 1951); and Conquer: The Story of<br />
the Ninth <strong>Army</strong>. The Sylvan Diary and the Gay<br />
Diary give details of the reactions at the First and<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> headquarters, respectively. Details<br />
of troop movements are given in the First U.S.<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Report of Operations and the AAR’s of the<br />
V and VIII Corps. A good analysis of troop<br />
strengths will be found in a British study by the<br />
Directorate of Tactical Investigation, War <strong>Of</strong>fice,<br />
been comrades in World War I, and<br />
when Hodges <strong>as</strong>ked for <strong>as</strong>sistance Simp-<br />
son acted promptly and generously. On<br />
the 16th, for example, Simpson offered<br />
the 30th Infantry Division and the 5th<br />
Armored on his own initiative.<br />
Prior to the inv<strong>as</strong>ion of Normandy<br />
t<strong>here</strong> had been a great deal of staff<br />
planning for the creation of a SHAEF<br />
strategic reserve for use in the first nine-<br />
ty days of the operation in western Eu-<br />
rope. The Allied successes during the<br />
summer and autumn put these plans in<br />
moth balls and the subject w<strong>as</strong> not re-<br />
opened until early December when<br />
Eisenhower ordered that a strategic re-<br />
serve be <strong>as</strong>sembled and placed under<br />
the 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group, but for employ-<br />
ment only at his direction <strong>as</strong> Supreme<br />
Allied Commander. Two days before<br />
the Ardennes attack the SHAEF opera-<br />
tions section submitted a plan calling for<br />
a strategic reserve of at le<strong>as</strong>t three di-<br />
visions. The concept, quite clearly, w<strong>as</strong><br />
to am<strong>as</strong>s a force capable of exploiting<br />
a success on any sector of the Allied<br />
front without diverting divisions from<br />
other parts of the front. Some opera-<br />
tions officer, possibly imbued with the<br />
Leavenworth doctrine of “Completed<br />
Staff Work,” inserted the observation<br />
that “a strategic reserve could be used<br />
to repel a serious breakthrough by<br />
German forces,” but h<strong>as</strong>tened to add:<br />
“In view of current G–2 estimates, it<br />
is unlikely that such employment will<br />
become necessary.” 3<br />
<strong>To</strong> understand fully the position in<br />
which the Supreme Commander found<br />
himself on 16 December, it should be<br />
entitled The German Counter <strong>Of</strong>fensive in the<br />
Ardennes (n.d.).<br />
3 Hq SHAEF files: GCT 322-12/Ops(A), sub:<br />
SHAEF Reserve.
334 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
remembered that American troops were<br />
in constant movement to Europe and<br />
the higher staffs tended to look upon<br />
the next few troopships <strong>as</strong> containing a<br />
reserve which could and would be used<br />
by the Supreme Commander to influ-<br />
ence the direction of the battle. Four<br />
U.S. infantry divisions and one armored<br />
division were scheduled to arrive on the<br />
Continent in December, with an equal<br />
number slated for January. <strong>Of</strong> the De-<br />
cember contingent two infantry divisions<br />
(the 87th and 104th) were already in<br />
the line when the Germans struck.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remained en route the 11th<br />
Armored Division and the 66th and<br />
75th Infantry Divisions, the 75th hav-<br />
ing already crossed the Channel on<br />
its way to the front. Two additional<br />
U.S. divisions were training in the<br />
United Kingdom and waiting for equip-<br />
ment, but neither w<strong>as</strong> expected to cross<br />
the Channel during December: the 17th<br />
Airborne w<strong>as</strong> scheduled for France in<br />
January, and the 8th Armored Division,<br />
still missing many of its authorized ve-<br />
hicles, w<strong>as</strong> not <strong>as</strong> yet on a movements<br />
list. 4<br />
The only combatwise divisions ready<br />
to the hand of the Supreme Command-<br />
er were the 82d and 101st Airborne<br />
Divisions, which had been brought back<br />
to France after the long, tough battle<br />
in the Netherlands and were not expect-<br />
ed to regain full operational status un-<br />
til mid-January. By the 17th, however,<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> clear that the First <strong>Army</strong> had to<br />
be heavily reinforced, and promptly.<br />
General Eisenhower reluctantly gave the<br />
airborne troops to Bradley.<br />
From this point on the immediate re-<br />
inforcements needed to meet and halt<br />
4 Hq SHAEF files: O and E SHAEF G–3, 370.5-<br />
4, vol. 1, Flow of Divisions.<br />
the German counteroffensive would have<br />
to come from the armies in the field.<br />
(Simpson had already thrown the 30th<br />
Infantry into the pot, in addition to the<br />
7th Armored.) Late in the evening of<br />
the 17th Bradley telephoned Patton,<br />
who w<strong>as</strong> starting to move his troops in-<br />
to <strong>as</strong>sembly are<strong>as</strong> for the Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
attack on the Saar, and told the latter<br />
that two more divisions might have to<br />
go north. By midnight of 17 December<br />
approximately 60,000 men and 11,000<br />
vehicles were on the move to reinforce<br />
Hodges’ First <strong>Army</strong>. In the following<br />
eight days three times this number of<br />
men and vehicles would be diverted<br />
from other are<strong>as</strong> to meet the Germans<br />
in the Ardennes.<br />
One piece of military thinking dom-<br />
inated in all the higher U.S. military<br />
headquarters and is clearly traceable in<br />
the initial decisions made by Eisenhow-<br />
er, Bradley, and the army and corps<br />
commanders. The <strong>Army</strong> service schools<br />
during the period between the two<br />
World Wars had taught <strong>as</strong> doctrine-<br />
a doctrine derived from the great offen-<br />
sives of 1917 and 1918 on the Western<br />
Front–that the salient or bulge pro-<br />
duced by a large-scale offensive can be<br />
contained and finally er<strong>as</strong>ed only if the<br />
shoulders are firmly held. The initial<br />
movements of the American reinforce-<br />
ments were in response to this doc-<br />
trine.<br />
The 30th Division Meets Peiper<br />
The 30th Division (Maj. Gen. Leland<br />
S. Hobbs) w<strong>as</strong> resting in the neighbor-<br />
hood of Aachen, Germany, after hard<br />
fighting in the Roer River sector, when<br />
a call from the XIX Corps informed its<br />
commander of the German attack along
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 335<br />
the V and VIII Corps boundry. 5 At this<br />
time (the evening of 16 December)<br />
the situation did not seem too ominous<br />
and the division commander<br />
merely w<strong>as</strong> told that he should alert<br />
his units in the rest area. Shortly before<br />
noon of the following day the corps<br />
commander, Maj. Gen. Raymond S. Mc-<br />
Lain, telephoned to say: “I don’t know<br />
any of the details but you are going<br />
south. I think it is only temporary.”<br />
The 30th Division w<strong>as</strong> to move to an<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembly area north of Eupen w<strong>here</strong><br />
the V Corps commander, General Gerow,<br />
would issue detailed orders. Gerow’s instructions,<br />
actually received at noon,<br />
directed the 30th Division to relieve<br />
the 18th Infantry (1st Division) around<br />
Eupen and prepare for a counterattack<br />
to the southe<strong>as</strong>t in support of the 2d<br />
and 99th Divisions farther south. The<br />
rapid advance of Kampfgruppe Peiper,<br />
however, would catch the division in<br />
midp<strong>as</strong>sage, dr<strong>as</strong>tically changing the<br />
manner of its ultimate commitment. (See<br />
Map II.)<br />
At 1630, on 17 December, the division<br />
started the forty-mile trip to its<br />
new <strong>as</strong>sembly area moving by combat<br />
teams prepared to fight. The 30th Reconnaissance<br />
Troop, the 119th Infantry,<br />
117th Infantry, and 120th Infantry<br />
moved in that order, with tanks and<br />
tank destroyers interspersed between<br />
the regiments. Despite the presence of<br />
5 The records kept by the 30th Division are in<br />
a very good state and are particularly valuable in<br />
that they include a telephone record, attached to<br />
the G–3 journal, of important conversations be-<br />
tween the commander and his chief officers. Pub-<br />
lished works on the history of the division include<br />
Robert L. Hewitt, Workhorse of the Western<br />
Front (W<strong>as</strong>hington: Infantry Journal Press, 1946) ;<br />
<strong>History</strong> of the 117th Infantary (W<strong>as</strong>hington,<br />
1946); and <strong>History</strong> of the 120th Infantry Kegi-<br />
rnent (W<strong>as</strong>hington, 1947).<br />
a few German aircraft which picked up<br />
the column early in the move and hung<br />
about dropping flares or making futile<br />
strafing p<strong>as</strong>ses, the leading regiment<br />
closed by midnight. Meanwhile the V<br />
Corps commander, apprehensive lest the<br />
1st SS Panzer Division column thrusting<br />
south of Malmédy should destroy the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t connection between his own and the<br />
VIII Corps, ordered General Hobbs to<br />
switch his leading combat team to Mal-<br />
médy at daylight.<br />
Since the 119th had detrucked and<br />
bedded down for the night, the <strong>as</strong>sist-<br />
ant division commander, Brig. Gen.<br />
William K. Harrison, Jr., caught the<br />
117th Infantry on the road and direct-<br />
ed it toward Malmédy. Its way fitfully<br />
lighted by enemy flares, the 117th (Col.<br />
Walter M. Johnson) moved cautiously<br />
south from Eupen. In early morning<br />
the head of the regimental column w<strong>as</strong><br />
bucking the heavy stream of traffic leav-<br />
ing Malmédy when new orders arrived:<br />
one battalion w<strong>as</strong> to go to Stavelot, erect<br />
a roadblock, and prevent the Germans<br />
from advancing north of the Ambleve<br />
River. Colonel Johnson hurried his 1st<br />
Battalion toward Stavelot, deployed the<br />
2d Battalion on the ridge between Stave-<br />
lot and Malmédy, then organized the<br />
defense of Malmédy with the 3d Bat-<br />
talion and the troops already in the<br />
town.<br />
At daybreak on 18 December the re-<br />
mainder of the 30th Division w<strong>as</strong> on<br />
the road to Malmédy with the 120th<br />
Infantry in the lead, under new orders<br />
for a division attack to the southe<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
The V Corps G–3 had told General<br />
Hobbs that he expected this attack to<br />
be made not earlier than 19 December.<br />
But the German attack on Stavelot dur-<br />
ing the morning caused consternation
336 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
in both the corps and army headquar-<br />
ters, from which erupted a stream of<br />
orders and demands for greater speed.<br />
Har<strong>as</strong>sed by confusing and contradic-<br />
tory directions, Hobbs finally had to<br />
<strong>as</strong>k that he be given orders from but<br />
one source. As it w<strong>as</strong>, the 119th Infan-<br />
try, still in Eupen, w<strong>as</strong> alerted for Stave-<br />
lot while the 120th Infantry, painfully<br />
slipped and slid along the muddy roads<br />
to Malmédy. Before trucks could arrive<br />
for the 119th Infantry Stavelot had fallen<br />
to the enemy. The First <strong>Army</strong> com-<br />
mander called Hobbs to Spa about noon.<br />
Before leaving Eupen, General Hobbs<br />
instructed the 119th Infantry (Col. Ed-<br />
ward M. Sutherland) to meet him at<br />
Theux, five miles north of Spa, at which<br />
time he expected to have new orders.<br />
General Hodges had just finished a<br />
conference with the acting commander<br />
of the XVIII Airborne Corps, Maj.<br />
Gen. James M. Gavin, whose two divi-<br />
sions, the 82d and 101st Airborne, had<br />
started advance parties from France for<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne area w<strong>here</strong>, according to<br />
the initial orders from SHAEF, the divi-<br />
sions were to be employed. The First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> commander, under whose orders<br />
the XVIII Airborne Corps now fell,<br />
determined to divert the 82d Airborne<br />
Division to Werbomont <strong>as</strong> a backstop in<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e Kampfgruppe Peiper succeeded in<br />
crossing the Amblève and Salm Rivers.<br />
The 82d, however, would not be in posi-<br />
tion before 19 December at the earliest.<br />
Meanwhile the 30th Division com-<br />
mander reached the First <strong>Army</strong> head-<br />
quarters. In the midst of a discussion of<br />
new plans, word came in that the First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Iiaison planes scudding under the<br />
clouds had seen the German armor mov-<br />
ing north from Trois Ponts in the di-<br />
rection of La Gleize and Stoumont. It<br />
w<strong>as</strong> apparent that the enemy had two<br />
choices: he could continue north along<br />
the Ambléve valley, thus threatening the<br />
rearward installations of the First <strong>Army</strong>;<br />
or he could turn west toward Werbo-<br />
mont and so present a grave menance to<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sembly of the 82d. Hobbs, then,<br />
met Colonel Sutherland with First <strong>Army</strong><br />
orders which would split the 119th In-<br />
fantry, sending one force along the val-<br />
ley of the Amblève, the other to Wer-<br />
bomont and thence to Trois Ponts.<br />
The 119th left General Hobbs and<br />
traveled south to Remouchamps. At<br />
this point it divided, one detachment<br />
made up of the 2d Battalion and the<br />
cannon company heading for Werbo-<br />
mont, the second and stronger column<br />
winding along the road that descended<br />
into the Amblève valley. The 2d Bat-<br />
talion reached Lienne Creek after dark<br />
and threw up h<strong>as</strong>ty defenses on the hills<br />
about three miles e<strong>as</strong>t of Werbomont.<br />
The Germans under Peiper had been<br />
stopped at the creek earlier, it will be<br />
recalled, but the battalion w<strong>as</strong> in time<br />
to ambush and destroy the separate<br />
scouting force in the late evening. The<br />
3d Battalion, leading the truck column<br />
carrying the bulk of the combat team,<br />
reached Stoumont after dark and hur-<br />
ried to form a perimeter defense. Pa-<br />
trols pushing out from the village had<br />
no difficulty in discovering the enemy,<br />
whose pickets were smoking and talk-<br />
ing not more than 2,000 yards away. At<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t forty German tanks were reported<br />
in bivouac e<strong>as</strong>t of the village. Under<br />
cover of darkness the remainder of the<br />
American force <strong>as</strong>sembled some three<br />
miles northwest of Stoumont, while the<br />
400th Armored Field Artillery Battal-<br />
ion, picked up during the march, moved<br />
its batteries forward in the dark. Both
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 337<br />
Americans and Germans, then, were<br />
ready with the coming of day to do bat-<br />
tle for Stoumont.<br />
The 117th Infantry, first of the 30th<br />
Division regiments to be fed into the<br />
line, had been deploying on the morn-<br />
ing of 18 December around Malmèdy.<br />
Its 1st Battalion (Lt. Col. Ernest<br />
Frankland), under orders to occupy<br />
Stavelot, circled through Francorchamps<br />
to approach the town from the north.<br />
On the road Colonel Frankland met of-<br />
ficers of the 526th Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion who told him that the enemy<br />
w<strong>as</strong> in Stavelot. About this time word<br />
of the German success reached the V<br />
Corps headquarters, w<strong>here</strong> it w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sumed that the 1st Battalion would per-<br />
force abandon its mission. Frankland,<br />
on the contrary, kept on going. He<br />
made contact about 1300 with a rifle<br />
company of the 526th Armored Infan-<br />
try Battalion remaining near Stavelot,<br />
then detrucked his battalion north of<br />
the still-flaming g<strong>as</strong>oline roadblock and<br />
started south toward the town.<br />
All this while Peiper believed that<br />
the 3d Parachute Division w<strong>as</strong> close<br />
behind his column. Expecting it to<br />
reach Stavelot by the evening of 18<br />
December, he had left only a small<br />
holding force in the town. In fact, the<br />
3d Parachute Division had been held up<br />
by a combination of jammed roads and<br />
unexpectedly tenacious American resist-<br />
ance. The Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
fore did not expect the advance guard<br />
of the 3d Parachute Division to arrive in<br />
Stavelot before 19 December. At this<br />
point the failure of communications be-<br />
tween Peiper and rearward German<br />
headquarters began to influence the<br />
course of operations, to the distinct dis-<br />
advantage of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
Although without artillery support,<br />
Colonel Frankland launched his at-<br />
tack at Stavelot. On the slope north<br />
of the town a platoon of 3-inch towed<br />
tank destroyers from the 823d Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion made good use of<br />
positions above the Germans to knock<br />
out a brace of Mark VI tanks and a few<br />
half-tracks. The two leading companies<br />
of the 1st Battalion had just reached the<br />
houses at the northern edge of the town<br />
when ten hostile tanks, returning in<br />
h<strong>as</strong>te from Trois Ponts, counterattacked.<br />
It might have gone hard with the<br />
American infantry but for the<br />
fighter-bombers of the IX Tactical Air<br />
Command and XXIX Tactical Air Com-<br />
mand which opportunely entered the<br />
fray. During the afternoon the American<br />
planes had worked e<strong>as</strong>t from the La<br />
Gleize area, w<strong>here</strong> the little liaison<br />
planes had first signaled the presence<br />
of German columns, and struck w<strong>here</strong>-<br />
ever Peiper’s tanks and motor vehicles<br />
could be found. Perhaps the trail pro-<br />
vided by the rearward serials of Kampf-<br />
gruppe Peiper led the fighter-bombers<br />
to Stavelot; perhaps the 109th Tactical<br />
Reconnaissance Squadron, which broke<br />
through the clouds to make one sweep<br />
over the town, tipped off the squadrons<br />
working farther west. Before the Ger-<br />
man tanks could make headway, planes<br />
from the 365th Fighter Group, rein-<br />
forced by the 390th Squadron (366th)<br />
and the 506th Squadron (404th),<br />
plunged in, crippled a few enemy ve-<br />
hicles, and drove the balance to cover,<br />
leaving the infantry and tank destroyers<br />
to carry out the clean-up inside Stavelot<br />
on more equitable terms. By dark the two<br />
American companies held half of the<br />
town, had tied in with the 2d Battalion<br />
between Stavelot and Malmèdy, and were
338 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
reinforced by a tank platoon from the<br />
743d Tank Battalion. Also the riflemen<br />
had the comforting knowledge that they<br />
could call for and receive artillery sup-<br />
port: the 118th Field Artillery Battalion<br />
had moved through bullet fire and set<br />
up northe<strong>as</strong>t of the town.<br />
The fight for Stavelot continued all<br />
through the night of the 18th with Ger-<br />
man tanks, now free from the air threat,<br />
working through the streets <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong><br />
the town square. At daybreak the 1st<br />
Battalion and its tanks went to work and<br />
by noon had reclaimed all of the town<br />
down to the Amblève River. Twice dur-<br />
ing the afternoon tank-led formations<br />
drove toward the town, but both times<br />
the American gunners dispersed the field<br />
gray infantry and the tanks decided not<br />
to chance the <strong>as</strong>sault alone. It is not sur-<br />
prising that the German infantry gave<br />
over the field. The 118th cannoneers<br />
fired 3,000 shells into the <strong>as</strong>sault waves,<br />
working their guns so f<strong>as</strong>t that the tubes<br />
had to be cooled with water.<br />
By the night of 19 December the 1st<br />
Battalion had a firm grip on Stavelot—<br />
but, in the most telling stroke of all,<br />
its attached engineers had dynamited<br />
the Amblève bridge across which Pei-<br />
per’s force had rolled west on the morn-<br />
ing of 18 December. The armored<br />
weight of the 1st SS Panzer Division<br />
could make itself felt only if it con-<br />
tinued punching westward. Without<br />
fuel the punch and drive were gone.<br />
AMBLEVE RIVER BRIDGE AT STAVELOT
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 339<br />
Without the Amblève bridge and a free<br />
line of communications through Stavelot<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no fuel for Peiper. Without<br />
Peiper the freeway to the Meuse which<br />
the 1st SS Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong> to open<br />
for the following divisions of the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> remained nothing more<br />
than a cul-de-sac.<br />
Could the 30th Division surround and<br />
destroy Kampfgruppe Peiper before<br />
German reinforcements from the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
reopened the way to their now isolated<br />
comrades? Would the 30th Division, its<br />
rear and right flank partially uncovered,<br />
be left free to deal with Peiper? The<br />
latter question w<strong>as</strong> very real, even with<br />
the 8rd Airborne moving in, for on the<br />
morning of 19 December the V Corps<br />
commander had warned the 30th Divi-<br />
sion chief of staff (Col. Richard W.<br />
Stephens) that large German forces<br />
had slipped by to the south and were<br />
moving on Hotton. An additional<br />
question plagued the 30th Division:<br />
w<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> the 7th Armored? Patrols<br />
sent out toward Recht on the 19th could<br />
find no trace of the tankers.<br />
While the 1st Battalion, 117th Infan-<br />
try, w<strong>as</strong> busily severing the lifeline to<br />
Kampfgruppe Peiper on 19 December,<br />
Peiper w<strong>as</strong> engaged with the bulk of<br />
his troops in an attempt to bl<strong>as</strong>t a<br />
path through Stoumont, the barrier to<br />
the l<strong>as</strong>t possible exit west, that is, the<br />
valley of the Amblève. Battle long since<br />
had been joined at Stoumont when<br />
scouts finally reached Peiper with the<br />
story of what had happened to his line<br />
of communications.<br />
The kampfgruppe, whose major part<br />
w<strong>as</strong> now <strong>as</strong>sembled in the vicinity of<br />
La Gleize and Stoumont, consisted of a<br />
mixed battalion of Mark IV tanks and<br />
Panthers from the 1st SS Panzer Regi-<br />
ment, a battalion of armored infantry<br />
from the 2d SS Panzer Grenadier Regi-<br />
ment, a flak battalion, a battalion of<br />
Tiger tanks (which had joined<br />
Peiper at Stavelot), a battery of<br />
105-mm. self-propelled guns, and a<br />
company from the 3d Parachute Division<br />
which had ridden on the tanks from<br />
Honsfeld. The force had suffered some<br />
losses in its breakthrough to the west,<br />
but these were not severe. By now the<br />
critical consideration w<strong>as</strong> g<strong>as</strong>oline. A<br />
few more miles on the road or a few<br />
hours of combat maneuvering and Pei-<br />
per’s fuel tanks would be bone dry.<br />
When the 119th Infantry (minus the<br />
2d Battalion) moved into the Stoumont<br />
area on the night of 18 December, the<br />
rifle companies of the 3d Battalion (Lt.<br />
Col. Roy G. Fitzgerald) deployed in a<br />
h<strong>as</strong>tily established line north, south,<br />
and e<strong>as</strong>t of the town. The 3d w<strong>as</strong> backed<br />
up by light 3-inch towed tank destroyers<br />
belonging to the 823d Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion, two 90-mm. antiaircraft guns<br />
detached from the 143d Antiaircraft<br />
Battalion, and three battalion 57-mm.<br />
antitank guns. The 1st Battalion, it will<br />
be remembered, dismounted in an <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembly area about three miles northwest<br />
of Stoumont, w<strong>here</strong> Colonel Sutherland<br />
located the regimental command post.<br />
The moment patrols had established the<br />
proximity of the large German force<br />
Sutherland w<strong>as</strong> alerted, and he promised<br />
a tank company <strong>as</strong> reinforcement first<br />
thing in the morning. For the rest of<br />
the night the troops around Stoumont<br />
dug foxholes, planted mines, and waited<br />
une<strong>as</strong>ily for day to break.<br />
Stoumont and the American lines<br />
lay on a bald hill m<strong>as</strong>s rising on the<br />
north bank of the Amblève. La Gleize,<br />
the enemy <strong>as</strong>sembly area, shared a simi-
340 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
lar situation on the road e<strong>as</strong>t of Stou-<br />
mont. The road itself, some distance<br />
from the river bank, approached Stou-<br />
mont through patches of trees, which<br />
gave way at the e<strong>as</strong>tern edge of the<br />
town to a border of level fields. The<br />
whole lent itself admirably to the em-<br />
ployment of armor.<br />
As the first light came on 19 Decem-<br />
ber Peiper threw his infantry into the<br />
attack, supporting this advance from the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t with tanks firing <strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sault guns.<br />
The grenadiers and paratroopers were<br />
checked by fire from the American<br />
lines <strong>as</strong> they crossed the open fields.<br />
But the gunners of the 823d, who could<br />
not see fifty yards from the muzzles of<br />
their guns and whose frantic calls for<br />
flares to be fired over the German tanks<br />
went unheeded, could not pick out the<br />
enemy armor. The panzers, formed in<br />
two columns, moved toward the fox-<br />
hole line and the American company<br />
on the e<strong>as</strong>t edge of Stoumont fell back<br />
to the houses, uncovering the outnum-<br />
bered and immobile towed tank de-<br />
stroyers, all eight of which were cap-<br />
tured. 6 At this moment the ten tanks<br />
from the 743d Tank Battalion promised<br />
by Sutherland arrived and went into ac-<br />
tion. The enemy t<strong>here</strong>upon reverted to<br />
tactics successfully employed in reducing<br />
village resistance on the march west,<br />
sending two or three of the heavy-ar-<br />
mored Panthers or Tigers in d<strong>as</strong>hes<br />
straight along the road and into the<br />
town. At le<strong>as</strong>t six German tanks were<br />
crippled or destroyed in this ph<strong>as</strong>e of<br />
the action, two of them by antiair-<br />
craft crewmen, Private Seamon and<br />
6 The 30th Division G–3 journal for 19 Decem-<br />
ber sums up this fight very simply: “We didn’t<br />
have <strong>as</strong> many ID’S <strong>as</strong> they had tanks.” Cf., 823d<br />
Tack Desrioyei Bn AAR, Dec 44.<br />
Pvt. Albert A. Darago, who were<br />
handling bazook<strong>as</strong> for the first time and<br />
who were awarded the DSC for their<br />
bravery. (An infantry officer had showed<br />
the antiaircraft crew how to load<br />
and fire the bazooka just before the<br />
battle began.) One of the two 90-mm.<br />
antiaircraft guns also did yeoman serv-<br />
ice in the unfamiliar ground-laying<br />
role and destroyed two tanks from Pei-<br />
per’s heavy Mark VI battalion before<br />
the German infantry got in close enough<br />
to force its abandonment.<br />
The Germans took some two hours to<br />
force their way inside Stoumont, but<br />
once the panzers ruled the streets the<br />
fight w<strong>as</strong> ended. The rifle company on<br />
the south w<strong>as</strong> cut off and the company in<br />
the town liquidated. The third company<br />
withdrew under a smoke screen laid<br />
down by white phosphorus grenades,<br />
reaching the reserve position manned by<br />
the 1st Battalion about noon. The tanks,<br />
commanded by 1st. Lt. Walter D. Macht,<br />
withdrew without loss, carrying survivors<br />
of the center company on their decks.<br />
The 3d Battalion had lost most of its<br />
equipment, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> 267 officers and<br />
men.<br />
This engagement had seen the Amer-<br />
icans fighting without the artillery sup-<br />
port so essential in American tactics.<br />
The 197th Field Artillery Battalion,<br />
<strong>as</strong>signed the direct support mission, did<br />
not reach firing positions in time to help<br />
the 3d Battalion. The 400th Armored<br />
Field Artillery Battalion w<strong>as</strong> finally able<br />
to place one battery w<strong>here</strong> it could give<br />
some help, but by this time the battle<br />
had been decided and the cannoneers<br />
fired only a few missions.<br />
Word that the fight w<strong>as</strong> going against<br />
the troops at Stoumont impelled Colonel<br />
Sutherland to alert his reserve battalion.
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 341<br />
Company C, dispatched <strong>as</strong> reinforce-<br />
ment, had reached the village of Targ-<br />
non when it began to p<strong>as</strong>s men of the<br />
3d Battalion moving to the rear. The<br />
company dismounted from its trucks and<br />
marched <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the entrance to Stou-<br />
mont. Failing to find the 3d Battalion<br />
commander the riflemen joined the<br />
tanks, which by this time had no infantry<br />
cover and were running low on ammuni-<br />
tion. The newly wedded tank-infantry<br />
team yielded ground only in a slow and<br />
orderly withdrawal. The impetus of the<br />
German advance w<strong>as</strong> considerably re-<br />
duced when a 90-mm. antiaircraft gun,<br />
sited at a bend in the road west of Stou-<br />
mont, knocked out a couple of German<br />
tanks and momentarily blocked the high-<br />
way.<br />
The situation w<strong>as</strong> precarious–and not<br />
only for the force left to Sutherland. The<br />
only armor between the 119th Infantry<br />
command post and Liége w<strong>as</strong> a detach-<br />
ment of ten Sherman tanks which had<br />
been whipped out of the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
repair shops, manned with ordnance<br />
mechanics, and dispatched through Ay-<br />
waille to block the Ambléve River road.<br />
In front of the 119th command post the<br />
ten tanks of the 743d had but few rounds<br />
left in their ammunition racks.<br />
At 1035 the 30th Division commander,<br />
who w<strong>as</strong> in Sutherland’s command post,<br />
called the First <strong>Army</strong> headquarters to<br />
<strong>as</strong>k for the 740th Tank Battalion. The<br />
S–2 of the 119th Infantry had discovered<br />
that this outfit, a new arrival on the Con-<br />
tinent, w<strong>as</strong> waiting to draw its tanks and<br />
other equipment at an ordnance depot<br />
near Sprimont, about ten miles north of<br />
the 119th command post. The First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> staff agreed to Hobbs’s request,<br />
but the unit it handed over w<strong>as</strong> far from<br />
being ready for combat. The depot had<br />
few fully equipped Shermans on hand<br />
and the first tank company drew four-<br />
teen Shermans fitted with British radios<br />
(unfamiliar to the American crews) , five<br />
duplex drive tanks, and a 90-mm. self-<br />
propelled gun. While Hobbs w<strong>as</strong> on the<br />
phone trying to convince the army staff<br />
that he must have the tanks, his chief of<br />
staff, Colonel Stephens, w<strong>as</strong> being bom-<br />
barded by army demands that some part<br />
of the 119th should be pulled out and<br />
shifted north to cover the road to Spa and<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> headquarters. This w<strong>as</strong> out<br />
of the question for the moment, for<br />
Sutherland had only a single battalion<br />
at his disposal.<br />
All this while the little tank-infantry<br />
team held to its slow-paced withdrawal<br />
along the river road, l<strong>as</strong>hing back at the<br />
Panthers in pursuit. Retreating through<br />
Targnon and Stoumont Station the force<br />
reached a very narrow curve w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
road p<strong>as</strong>sed between a steep hill and the<br />
river bank. Here Lt. Col. Robert Her-<br />
long, who now had all of his 1st Battalion<br />
engaged, ordered the tanks and infantry<br />
to make their stand. It w<strong>as</strong> about 1240.<br />
Fog w<strong>as</strong> beginning to creep over the<br />
valley. A forward observer from the<br />
197th Field Artillery Battalion, whose<br />
pieces now were in position, saw three<br />
German tanks leave Targnon and head<br />
down the road. A call sent a salvo cr<strong>as</strong>h-<br />
ing down on the western side of the vil-<br />
lage just <strong>as</strong> a large tank column started<br />
to follow the German point. Followed by<br />
more shells these tanks turned hurriedly<br />
back into Targnon. One of the point<br />
tanks did reach the American position,<br />
poked its nose around the bend in the<br />
road, got a round of high explosive un-<br />
comfortably close, and took off.<br />
If is true that Herlong’s tanks and in-<br />
fantry held a naturally formidable road-
342<br />
block. And the presence of artillery once<br />
again showed what it could do to alter<br />
the course of battle. But Peiper’s object<br />
in the advance beyond Stoumont w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
to crush his way through the 119th Infan-<br />
try and move north through the defiles<br />
of the Amblève valley. His object, thus<br />
far unachieved, w<strong>as</strong> to climb out of the<br />
valley confines and resume the westerly<br />
advance toward Huy and the Meuse.<br />
Peiper had been thwarted at Trois Ponts<br />
and at Lienne Creek in turn. The ad-<br />
vance through Stoumont offered a l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
opportunity, for midway between Targ-<br />
non and Stoumont Station lay an e<strong>as</strong>y<br />
approach to the river, a bridge <strong>as</strong> yet<br />
untouched, and a p<strong>as</strong>sable road rising<br />
from the valley to join the highway lead-<br />
ing west through Werbomont, the road<br />
from which Peiper’s force had been de-<br />
flected. With this bridge in German<br />
hands, Peiper had only to contain the<br />
119th Infantry which had been retiring<br />
before his tanks while his main column<br />
crossed to the west. But Peiper knew by<br />
this time that his supply line had been<br />
cut at Stavelot. “We began to realize,” he<br />
says, “that we had insufficient g<strong>as</strong>oline to<br />
cross the bridge west of Stoumont.” 7<br />
Unaware of the enemy predicament,<br />
the 119th Infantry took advantage of the<br />
lull which had followed the single Ger-<br />
man p<strong>as</strong>s at the roadblock position to re-<br />
organize the remnants of the 3d Battal-<br />
ion. About 1530 the leading platoon of<br />
the conglomerate company taken from<br />
the 740th Tank Battalion arrived, but<br />
the additional infantry for which Colo-<br />
nel Sutherland had pleaded were not<br />
forthcoming. Indeed, his weakened 3d<br />
7 Ferriss, Special Rpt B<strong>as</strong>ed on Intervs in Janu-<br />
ary 1945. Peiper’s progress <strong>as</strong> it w<strong>as</strong> known to<br />
the higher command may be traced in the daily<br />
entries of the OB WEST KTB.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Battalion w<strong>as</strong> already earmarked for use<br />
in the event the enemy turned north on<br />
the secondary road running from Stou-<br />
mont directly to Spa and the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
headquarters. However, Sutherland w<strong>as</strong><br />
told that the 2d Battalion, 119th Infan-<br />
try, w<strong>as</strong> in process of turning its position<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Werbomont over to the 82d Air-<br />
borne Division and would be available<br />
in a few hours.<br />
Anxious to feel out the enemy and<br />
establish a good line of departure for an<br />
attack on 20 December, Sutherland or-<br />
dered the 1st Battalion commander to<br />
push out from the roadblock, using Capt.<br />
James D. Berry’s untried and con-<br />
glomerate tank company. About 1600<br />
Herlong started e<strong>as</strong>t, Company C advanc-<br />
ing on both sides of the road and tanks<br />
moving in the center. Just west of Stou-<br />
mont Station three Panthers were sighted<br />
and destroyed in quick succession, one by<br />
a fluke shot which glanced from the pave-<br />
ment up through the tank flooring. The<br />
dead tanks blocked the road; so Herlong<br />
sent his infantry on alone and organized<br />
a line at the western edge of the station.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no further contact with the<br />
Germans. Peiper, whose mechanized<br />
force by this time w<strong>as</strong> nearly immobile,<br />
had withdrawn his advanced troops back<br />
to Stoumont, about two and a half miles<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of the station. As for the road lead-<br />
ing from Stoumont to Spa, a matter of<br />
grave concern to First <strong>Army</strong> headquar-<br />
ters on 19 December, Peiper, acutely<br />
conscious of his lack of mobility, never<br />
gave it a serious thought.<br />
In midafternoon the 119th Infantry<br />
and the 740th Tank Battalion (Lt. Col.<br />
George K. Rubel) had been detached<br />
from the 30th Division and <strong>as</strong>signed to<br />
the operational control of the XVIII Air-<br />
borne Corps, which at the same time took
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 343<br />
back its 82d Airborne Division from the<br />
V Corps and in addition received the 3d<br />
Armored Division (-) . The XVIII<br />
Corps commander thus had an entire<br />
airborne division, more than half of an<br />
armored division, and a reinforced regi-<br />
mental combat team to employ in check-<br />
ing a further westward drive by the<br />
Germans <strong>as</strong>sembled in the La Gleize-<br />
Werbomont-Stoumont area.<br />
The subsequent operations of the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps would be molded<br />
in considerable degree by events prior to<br />
its appearance in the battle area. Already<br />
set forth have been the engagements in<br />
the Stoumont sector with two battalions<br />
of the 119th Infantry committed. The 2d<br />
Battalion of the 119th Infantry had left<br />
the regiment on 18 December with the<br />
independent mission of blocking the<br />
Germans at Werbomont and Trois<br />
Ponts, thus covering the <strong>as</strong>sembly of the<br />
82d Airborne. Late in the afternoon the<br />
battalion reached Werbomont, found no<br />
sign of the enemy, and detrucked for the<br />
march to Trois Ponts. About dusk the<br />
column reached the Lienne Creek in the<br />
vicinity of Habiemont, a village on a<br />
bald summit overlooking the Lienne.<br />
Here Maj. Hal D. McCown, the battal-<br />
ion commander, learned that German<br />
tanks had been sighted at Chevron,<br />
another hamlet a mile or so north on the<br />
Lienne. McCown, whose battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
reinforced by a platoon each of tanks,<br />
tank destroyers, and infantry cannon,<br />
turned north only to find that the bridge<br />
near Chevron had been destroyed by<br />
friendly engineers and that no hostile<br />
crossing had been made. He moved<br />
north again but this time encountered<br />
fire from across the creek. Uncertain <strong>as</strong><br />
to the situation and with darkness upon<br />
him, McCown ordered the battalion to<br />
deploy on the bare ridge line rising west<br />
of the creek.<br />
Some time later the Americans heard<br />
tracks clanking along the road between<br />
their position and the creek; this w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
reconnaissance detachment which Peiper<br />
had sent north and which had found a<br />
bridge, albeit too weak a structure for<br />
the German tanks. A brief fusillade from<br />
the ridge and the Germans fled, leaving<br />
five battered half-tracks behind. One<br />
prisoner from the 2d SS Panzer Grenu-<br />
dier Regiment w<strong>as</strong> taken. His company,<br />
he told interrogators, w<strong>as</strong> the advance<br />
guard of a four-company detachment<br />
whose mission w<strong>as</strong> to reconnoiter toward<br />
Werbomont and take that town. But no<br />
other attempt w<strong>as</strong> made that night to run<br />
the 2d Battalion gauntlet. Screened by<br />
McCown’s force, the 82d Airborne Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> free to detruck and <strong>as</strong>semble<br />
around Werbomont, <strong>as</strong> the night pro-<br />
gressed, according to plan.<br />
Recall that on the morning of 18<br />
December the 82d Airborne Division<br />
started for B<strong>as</strong>togne but w<strong>as</strong> diverted<br />
short of its destination and ordered to<br />
Werbomont. General Gavin had gone<br />
from the First <strong>Army</strong> headquarters to<br />
Werbomont and made a personal recon-<br />
naissance of the ground <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the<br />
Amblève River. This, of course, w<strong>as</strong> on<br />
the morning of the 18th so that he saw<br />
none of the enemy forces who at that<br />
moment were turning in the direction of<br />
Werbomont. The advance party of the<br />
82d arrived in the village at dark and<br />
opened the division command post. Al-<br />
though t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> now serious question<br />
whether the convoys of the 82d would<br />
reach Werbomont in force before the<br />
Germans, the bulk of the division moved<br />
without opposition into the area during<br />
the night of 18 December. The follow-
344 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
ing morning Maj. Gen. Matthew B.<br />
Ridgway, who had resumed command<br />
of the airborne corps, opened his corps<br />
command post near that of the 82d,<br />
once again under Gavin.<br />
Later in the morning at the First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> headquarters (which had moved<br />
to Chaudfontaine) , General Hodges<br />
gave Ridgway the directive which would<br />
make the airborne corps operational and<br />
flesh it out with troops. The corps’ mis-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> to block further German ad-<br />
vance along an irregular line extending<br />
GENERAL RIDGWAY AND GENERAL GAVIN<br />
from the Amblève through Manhay and<br />
Houffalize to La Roche on the Ourthe<br />
River, placing the corps’ right boundary<br />
twenty miles northwest of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Three threatened are<strong>as</strong> were known to<br />
be in the newly <strong>as</strong>signed zone of opera-<br />
tions: the Amblève River sector, w<strong>here</strong><br />
the 119th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> deployed; the<br />
Salm River sector, especially at Trois<br />
Ponts w<strong>here</strong> a lone engineer company<br />
still barred the crossings (although this<br />
information w<strong>as</strong> unknown to the 82d) ;<br />
and the general area north of the Ourthe
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 345<br />
River w<strong>here</strong> a vague and ill-defined Ger-<br />
man movement had been reported. But<br />
beyond checking these specific enemy ad-<br />
vances the XVIII Airborne Corps had<br />
the more difficult t<strong>as</strong>k of sealing the gap<br />
of nearly twenty miles which had opened<br />
between the V and VIII Corps.<br />
During the morning of 19 December<br />
the 504th and 505th Parachute Infantry<br />
Regiments marched out of the Werbo-<br />
mont <strong>as</strong>sembly area under orders to push<br />
to the fore <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> possible, relieve the<br />
2d Battalion, 119th Infantry, and im-<br />
prove the American defense line by<br />
adding a bridgehead across the Lienne<br />
Creek. T<strong>here</strong> were no Germans <strong>here</strong> and<br />
by noon the initial deployment w<strong>as</strong> close<br />
to completion. Meanwhile rumors had<br />
reached the First <strong>Army</strong> command post<br />
that the enemy had cut the main north-<br />
south highway running between B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne and Liège in the neighborhood of<br />
Houffalize. More rumors, mostly from<br />
truck drivers whose missions on the rear<br />
area roads usually gave them first sight<br />
of the westernmost German spearheads,<br />
put the enemy somew<strong>here</strong> near Hotton,<br />
ten miles northwest of the XVIII Air-<br />
borne Corps boundary marker at La<br />
Roche. H<strong>as</strong>tily complying with First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> orders, the 3d Battalion of the<br />
325th Glider Infantry Regiment and a<br />
tank destroyer platoon set off southwest-<br />
ward to block the approaches to Hotton.<br />
By nightfall the battalion w<strong>as</strong> in place,<br />
stuck out alone on the corps’ right wing<br />
and waiting for troops of the 3d Armored<br />
to appear. A couple of hours before mid-<br />
night a patrol did meet the armored<br />
“point”-Maj. Gen. Maurice Rose, the<br />
3d Armored commander, riding in a<br />
jeep far in front of his tank columns.<br />
The main body of the 82d Airborne<br />
Division began to push toward the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
and south in midafternoon. With the<br />
508th Parachute Infantry in support, the<br />
504th and 505th moved along the roads<br />
toward La Gleize and Trois Ponts re-<br />
spectively. This proved to be only a route<br />
march, for the Germans were now<strong>here</strong><br />
about. 8 By midnight the 505th had a bat-<br />
talion each in the villages of Haute-Bo-<br />
deux and B<strong>as</strong>se-Bodeux, effectively back-<br />
stopping the small American force which<br />
still held Trois Ponts. The 504th, which<br />
had marched northe<strong>as</strong>t, occupied the<br />
village of Rahier with two battalions.<br />
The 325th Glider Infantry, minus the<br />
battalion sent to Hotton, remained in<br />
and around Werbomont <strong>as</strong> corps and<br />
division reserve. One of its companies<br />
moved during the evening to the cross-<br />
roads at Manhay, due south of Werbo-<br />
mont, a crossroads which General Ridg-<br />
way styled “of vital significance.” And a<br />
company of the 508th meanwhile estab-<br />
lished an outpost position on the<br />
Manhay-Trois Ponts road at Br<strong>as</strong>.<br />
By the morning of 20 December, t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
fore, the 82d Airborne Division had<br />
pushed a defensive screen north, e<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
south, and west of Werbomont. It is true<br />
that to the south and west the screen con-<br />
sisted only of motorized patrols and<br />
widely separated pickets in small vil-<br />
lages, but now t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a good chance<br />
that any major enemy thrust could be<br />
detected and channelized or retarded.<br />
Thus far, however, the XVIII Airborne<br />
Corps w<strong>as</strong> making its deployment against<br />
an unseen enemy. Indeed, so confused<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the situation into which Ridgway<br />
8 The German intelligence w<strong>as</strong> unaware that the<br />
XVIII Airborne w<strong>as</strong> in this area. Radio intercept,<br />
however, had warned that a combat command of<br />
the 3d Armored would move to the Werbomont<br />
sector very shortly. OB WEST: I.C. Tagesmeldung,<br />
Anlage 1:2 (19 Dec 44).
346 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
TROOPS OF 325TH GLIDER INFANTRY MOVING THROUGH FOG TO A NEW POSITION<br />
had been thrust that at midnight on 19<br />
December he w<strong>as</strong> forced to send an ur-<br />
gent message to Hodges <strong>as</strong>king for infor-<br />
mation on any V or VIII Corps units in<br />
his zone. But his corps w<strong>as</strong> substantially<br />
strengthened by the next morning. CCB<br />
of the 3d Armored Division had reached<br />
Theux, about ten miles north of Stou-<br />
mont, and w<strong>as</strong> ready for immediate use.<br />
The 3d Armored Division (minus CCA<br />
and CCB) had reached the road between<br />
Hotton and Manhay on the corps’ right<br />
wing. 9<br />
9 Since the 3d Armored Division w<strong>as</strong> deployed<br />
Ridgway had detailed plans for con-<br />
tinuing the pressure along the corps<br />
front from northe<strong>as</strong>t to southwest. CCB,<br />
with little connection between its combat com-<br />
mands and subordinate t<strong>as</strong>k forces, it is necessary<br />
to rely on the three combat commands’ AAR’s<br />
and journals. The separate t<strong>as</strong>k forces can be<br />
followed in the battalion S–3 journals. The semi-<br />
official history of the division, Spearhead in the<br />
West, 1941–45 (Frankfurt a/M, 1945), is very<br />
readable and informative. The story of T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Lovelady is related in A. E. Roberts, Five Stars to<br />
Victory (Birmingham, 1949). Both the 30th Di-<br />
vision and the 3d Armored are fairly well rep-<br />
resented in the collection of combat interviews. In<br />
addition, see Victory TD: The <strong>History</strong> of the<br />
628th TD Bn.
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 347<br />
3d Armored, w<strong>as</strong> to clear the e<strong>as</strong>t and<br />
north banks of the Amblève and estab-<br />
lish contact with the 117th Infantry,<br />
which had its hands full in Stavelot. The<br />
reinforced 119th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> to secure<br />
the Amblève River line from Stoumont<br />
to La Gleize. The 82d Airborne Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to take over the Salm River bridges<br />
at Trois Ponts, drive the enemy from the<br />
area between the Amblève and the Wer-<br />
bomont-Trois Ponts road, and make<br />
contact with CCB when the latter<br />
reached Stavelot, thus completing the en-<br />
MAP 2<br />
circlement of such enemy forces <strong>as</strong> might<br />
be left to the north. The 3d Armored Di-<br />
vision w<strong>as</strong> to fan out and push reconnais-<br />
sance <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the road between Manhay<br />
and Houffalize, locating and developing<br />
the shadowy German force believed to<br />
be bearing down on the sketchy corps<br />
right wing somew<strong>here</strong> north of Houffa-<br />
lize.<br />
The immediate and proximate threat,<br />
on the morning of 20 December, w<strong>as</strong><br />
Peiper’s force of the 1st SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sion, now concentrated with its bulk in<br />
H.C Brewer, Jr.
348 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the Stoumont-La Gleize area, but with<br />
an outpost holding the light bridge over<br />
the Amblève at Cheneux and its tail in-<br />
volved in a fight to reopen the rearward<br />
line of communications through Stave-<br />
lot. Kampfgruppe Peiper, it should be<br />
noticed, w<strong>as</strong> considerably weakened by<br />
this piecemeal deployment: further-<br />
more, it lacked the g<strong>as</strong>oline to undertake<br />
much maneuver even in this constricted<br />
area. (Map 2)<br />
CCB (Brig. Gen. Truman E. Bou-<br />
dinot) moved south p<strong>as</strong>t Spa on the<br />
morning of the 20th in three t<strong>as</strong>k forces,<br />
using three roads leading to the Stou-<br />
mont-La Gleize-Trois Ponts triangle.<br />
The largest of these detachments, T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Lovelady (Lt. Col. William B.<br />
Lovelady), had been given a complete<br />
tank battalion, reinforced by a company<br />
of armored infantry, and the important<br />
job of cutting the Stavelot-Stoumont<br />
road. Colonel Lovelady, then, led the<br />
force which formed the left jaw of the<br />
vise forming to clamp down on Kampf-<br />
gruppe Peiper. His t<strong>as</strong>k force, proceed-<br />
ing on the e<strong>as</strong>ternmost of the three<br />
routes, reached the junction of the Trois<br />
Ponts-Stoumont roads without sign of<br />
the enemy. Just <strong>as</strong> the column w<strong>as</strong> mak-<br />
ing the turn south toward Trois Ponts,<br />
a small enemy column of artillery, infan-<br />
try, and supply trucks appeared, appar-<br />
ently on its way to reinforce Peiper’s<br />
main body.<br />
Since Trois Ponts and Stavelot were<br />
both in American hands, the appearance<br />
of this train w<strong>as</strong> surprising. What had<br />
happened w<strong>as</strong> this: German engineers<br />
had reinforced a small footbridge e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Trois Ponts, at le<strong>as</strong>t to the point that it<br />
would sustain a self-propelled gun car-<br />
riage, and since the night of 18 Decem-<br />
ber supply trucks and reinforcements<br />
had used the bridge to slip between the<br />
two American-held towns. German rec-<br />
ords indicate that some much-needed<br />
g<strong>as</strong>oline reached Peiper through this<br />
hole in the American net, but the<br />
amount w<strong>as</strong> insufficient to set the kampf-<br />
gruppe rolling again even if the road<br />
west had been free. As to this particular<br />
German column, the Americans disposed<br />
of it in short order. T<strong>as</strong>k Force Lovelady<br />
continued on its mission and established<br />
three roadblocks along the main road<br />
between Trois Ponts and La Gleize. The<br />
Germans in the Stoumont sector were<br />
definitely sealed in, albeit still active, for<br />
four Shermans were destroyed by hidden<br />
antitank guns.<br />
The two remaining t<strong>as</strong>k forces of CCB<br />
and companion units from the 30th<br />
Division were less successful. T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
McGeorge (Maj. K. T. McGeorge) , the<br />
center column, made its advance along<br />
a road built on the side of a ridge<br />
which ran obliquely from the north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t toward La Gleize. Most of the<br />
ridge road w<strong>as</strong> traversed with no sight of<br />
the Germans. At Cour, about two miles<br />
from La Gleize, T<strong>as</strong>k Force McGeorge<br />
picked up Company K of the 117th In-<br />
fantry and moved on to <strong>as</strong>sault the latter<br />
town. Midway the Americans encoun-<br />
tered a roadblock held by a tank and a<br />
couple of <strong>as</strong>sault guns. Because the pitch<br />
of the ridge slope precluded any tank<br />
maneuver, the rifle company circled the<br />
German outpost and advanced <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong><br />
the outskirts of La Gleize. A sharp<br />
counterattack drove the infantry back in-<br />
to the tanks, still road-bound, and when<br />
the tanks themselves were threatened by<br />
close-in work McGeorge withdrew the<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force for the night to the hamlet of<br />
Borgoumont perched above La Gleize. It<br />
w<strong>as</strong> apparent that the Germans intended
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 349<br />
to hold on to La Gleize, although in fact<br />
the greater part of Peiper’s command by<br />
this time w<strong>as</strong> congregated to the west on<br />
the higher ground around Stoumont.<br />
The attack on Stoumont on the 20th<br />
w<strong>as</strong> a continuation of that begun late on<br />
the previous afternoon by the 1st Battal:<br />
ion of the 119th Infantry. The maneu-<br />
ver now, however, w<strong>as</strong> concentric. The<br />
1st Battalion and its accompanying tank<br />
company from the 740th Tank Battalion<br />
pushed along the road from the west<br />
while T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jordan (Capt. John<br />
W. Jordan), the l<strong>as</strong>t and smallest of<br />
the three CCB detachments, attempted<br />
a thrust from the north via the Spa road,<br />
which had given the First <strong>Army</strong> head-<br />
quarters so much concern. T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Jordan w<strong>as</strong> within sight of Stoumont<br />
when the tanks forming the point were<br />
suddenly brought under flanking fire by<br />
German tanks that had been dug in to<br />
give hull defilade. The two American<br />
lead tanks were knocked out immediate-<br />
ly. The rest of the column, fixed to the<br />
roadway by the forest and abrupt<br />
ground, could not deploy. Search for<br />
some other means of approach w<strong>as</strong> fu-<br />
tile, and the t<strong>as</strong>k force halted for the<br />
night on the road.<br />
The 1st Battalion, 119th Infantry, and<br />
the company of medium tanks from the<br />
740th Tank Battalion found slow but<br />
steady going in the first hours of the<br />
attack along the western road. With<br />
Company B and the tanks leading and<br />
with artillery and mortars firing rapidly<br />
in support, the battalion moved through<br />
Targnon. The Germans had constructed<br />
a series of mine fields to bar the<br />
winding road which climbed up the<br />
Stoumont hill and had left rear guard<br />
infantry on the slopes north of the road<br />
to cover these barriers by fire. At the<br />
close of day the attacking column had<br />
traversed some 3,000 yards and p<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
five mine fields (with only two tanks<br />
lost), the infantry advance guard climb-<br />
ing the wooded hillside to flank and<br />
denude each barrier.<br />
Now within 800 yards of the western<br />
edge of Stoumont and with darkness and<br />
a heavy fog settling over the town, Colo-<br />
nel Herlong gave orders for the column<br />
to close up for the night. One of the dis-<br />
abled tanks w<strong>as</strong> turned sidewise to block<br />
the narrow road, while Companies B and<br />
C moved up the hill north of this im-<br />
provised barrier to seize a sanatorium<br />
which overlooked the road and the town.<br />
The main sanatorium building stood on<br />
an earthen platform filled in <strong>as</strong> a pro-<br />
jection from the hillside rising north of<br />
the road. Its inmates, some two hundred<br />
sick children and old people, had taken<br />
to the b<strong>as</strong>ement. After a brief shelling<br />
the American infantry climbed over the<br />
fill and, shrouded in the fog, <strong>as</strong>saulted<br />
the building. The German infantry were<br />
driven out and four 20-mm. guns taken.<br />
Companies B and C dug in to form a<br />
line on the hillside in and around the<br />
sanatorium, and Company A disposed<br />
itself to cover the valley road. Four tanks<br />
were brought up the slope just below<br />
the fill and in this forward position were<br />
refueled by armored utility cars. The<br />
enemy foxhole line lay only some three<br />
hundred yards e<strong>as</strong>t of the companies on<br />
the hill.<br />
An hour before midnight the Germans<br />
suddenly descended on the sanatorium,<br />
shouting “Heil Hitler” and firing wildly.<br />
On the slope above the building German<br />
tanks had inched forward to positions<br />
from which they could fire directly into<br />
the sanatorium. American tanks were<br />
brought up but could not negotiate the
350<br />
steep banks at the fill. One w<strong>as</strong> set afire<br />
by a bazooka; two more were knocked<br />
out by German tanks which had crept<br />
down the main road. The flaming tanks<br />
and some outbuildings which had been<br />
set afire near the sanatorium so lighted<br />
the approach to the building that fur-<br />
ther American tank maneuver on the<br />
slope w<strong>as</strong> impossible. By this time Ger-<br />
man tanks had run in close enough to<br />
fire through the windows of the sanato-<br />
rium. The frenzied fight inside and<br />
around the building went on for a half<br />
hour or so, a duel with grenades and<br />
bullet fire at close quarters. About thirty<br />
men from Company B were captured <strong>as</strong><br />
the battle eddied through rooms and<br />
hallways, and the attackers finally gained<br />
possession of the main building. How-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
STOUMONT, SHOWING THE SANATORIUM<br />
ever, Sgt. William J. Widener with a<br />
group of eleven men held on in a small<br />
annex, the sergeant shouting out sens-<br />
ings-while American shells fell-to an<br />
artillery observer in a foxhole some fifty<br />
yards away. (Widener and Pfc. John<br />
Leinen, who braved enemy fire to keep<br />
the defenders of the annex supplied with<br />
ammunition, later received the DSC.)<br />
Although the German <strong>as</strong>sault had won<br />
possession of the sanatorium and had<br />
pushed back the American line on the<br />
slope to the north, accurate and incessant<br />
shellfire checked the attackers short of a<br />
breakthrough. About 0530 the enemy<br />
tried it again in a sortie from the town<br />
headed for the main road. But tank rein-<br />
forcements had arrived for the 1st Bat-<br />
talion and their fire, thickening that of
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 351<br />
the artillery, broke the attack before it<br />
could make appreciable headway. When<br />
day broke, the Americans still held the<br />
roadblock position but the enemy had<br />
the sanatorium. In the night of wild<br />
fighting half the complement of Com-<br />
panies B and C had been lost, including<br />
five platoon leaders.<br />
Despite the setbacks suffered during<br />
the American advance of 20 December<br />
on the Stoumont-La Gleize area, the net<br />
had been drawn appreciably tighter<br />
around Peiper. The German line of sup-<br />
ply-or retreat–w<strong>as</strong> cut by T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Lovelady and the Americans in Stavelot.<br />
The roads from Stoumont and La Gleize<br />
north to Spa were blocked by tank-<br />
infantry teams which had pushed very<br />
close to the former two towns. The 1st<br />
Battalion of the 119th Infantry had been<br />
checked at the sanatorium but nonethe-<br />
less w<strong>as</strong> at the very entrance to Stoumont<br />
and had the 2d Battalion behind it in<br />
regimental reserve.<br />
Also, during the 20th, the 82d Air-<br />
borne Division moved to close the circle<br />
around Peiper by operations aimed at<br />
er<strong>as</strong>ing the small German bridgehead at<br />
Cheneux on the Amblève southe<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Stoumont. The 82d had planned an ad-<br />
vance that morning to drive the enemy<br />
from the area bounded on the north by<br />
the Amblève River and by the Trois<br />
Ponts-Werbomont road on the south.<br />
The two regiments involved (the 504th<br />
Parachute Infantry on the left and the<br />
505th on the right) marched to their<br />
attack positions e<strong>as</strong>t of Werbomont with<br />
virtually no information except that they<br />
were to block the enemy, w<strong>here</strong>ver he<br />
might be found, in conjunction with<br />
friendly forces operating somew<strong>here</strong> off<br />
to the north and south. The first t<strong>as</strong>k.<br />
obviously, w<strong>as</strong> to reconnoiter for either<br />
enemy or friendly forces in the area.<br />
Patrols sent out at daybreak were gone<br />
for hours, but about noon, <strong>as</strong> bits of information<br />
began to arrive at General<br />
Gavin’s headquarters, the picture took<br />
some shape. Patrols working due north<br />
reached the 119th Infantry on the road<br />
west of Stoumont and reported that the<br />
countryside w<strong>as</strong> free of the enemy.<br />
Civilians questioned by patrols on the<br />
Werbomont-Stoumont road told the<br />
Americans that t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a concentration<br />
of tanks and other vehicles around<br />
Cheneux. Working e<strong>as</strong>tward, other patrols<br />
found that Trois Ponts w<strong>as</strong> occupied<br />
by Company C, 51st Engineers, and<br />
that the important bridges t<strong>here</strong> had all<br />
been damaged or destroyed. This word<br />
from Trois Ponts came <strong>as</strong> a surprise back<br />
at General Gavin’s headquarters w<strong>here</strong><br />
the presence of this single engineer company<br />
at the critical Trois Ponts crossing<br />
site w<strong>as</strong> quite unknown. 10<br />
The most important discovery made<br />
by the airborne infantry patrols w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
location of the 7th Armored Division<br />
troops in the gap between the XVIII Airborne<br />
Corps and B<strong>as</strong>togne. The w<strong>here</strong>abouts<br />
of the westernmost 7th Armored<br />
Division positions had been a question of<br />
grave import in the higher American<br />
headquarters for the p<strong>as</strong>t two days. Now<br />
a patrol from the 505th Parachute Infantry<br />
came in with information that they<br />
had reached a reconnaissance party of the<br />
7th Armored in the village of Fosse, a<br />
little over two miles southwest of Trois<br />
Ponts, and that troops of that division<br />
were forming an outpost line just to the<br />
south of the 505th positions.<br />
10 The engineers were not unaware of their im-<br />
portant role and the commanding officer showed this<br />
in his greeting to Colonel Ekman: “I’ll bet you guys<br />
are glad we’re <strong>here</strong>.” Combat Interv with Col Wil-<br />
liam-E. Ekman.
352 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Once General Gavin had a moderately<br />
clear picture of the situation confronting<br />
his division he ordered the two leading<br />
regiments forward: the 504th to Cheneux,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> the enemy had been reported,<br />
and the 505th to Trois Ponts. The 505th<br />
Commander, Col. William E. Ekman,<br />
already had dispatched bazooka teams to<br />
reinforce the engineer company at the<br />
latter point and by late afternoon had<br />
his 2d Battalion in Trois Ponts, with one<br />
company holding a bridgehead across the<br />
Salm.<br />
Acting under orders to reach Cheneux<br />
<strong>as</strong> quickly <strong>as</strong> possible and seize the Am-<br />
blève bridge, the 504th commander, Col.<br />
Reuben H. Tucker, 3d, sent Companies<br />
B and C of his 1st Battalion hurrying<br />
toward the village. The leading company<br />
w<strong>as</strong> nearing the outskirts of Cheneux in<br />
midafternoon when it came into a hail<br />
of machine gun and flak fire. Both com-<br />
panies deployed and took up the fire<br />
fight but quickly found that the village<br />
w<strong>as</strong> strongly defended. Ground haze w<strong>as</strong><br />
heavy and friendly artillery could not be<br />
adjusted to give a helping hand. Dark<br />
w<strong>as</strong> coming on and the companies with-<br />
drew to a wood west of Cheneux to await<br />
further orders.<br />
The 1st Battalion had not long to wait.<br />
New plans which would greatly extend<br />
the 82d Airborne Division front were<br />
already in execution and it w<strong>as</strong> impera-<br />
tive that the German bridgehead on the<br />
north flank of the division be er<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
promptly. Colonel Tucker ordered the<br />
1st Battalion commander (Lt. Col.<br />
Willard E. Harrison) to take the two<br />
companies and try a night attack. At<br />
1930 they moved out <strong>as</strong>tride the road<br />
west of Cheneux, two tank destroyers<br />
their only heavy support. The approach<br />
to the village brought the paratroopers<br />
across a knob completely barren of cover,<br />
sloping gradually up to the German posi-<br />
tions and crisscrossed with barbed wire.<br />
The hostile garrison, from the 2d SS<br />
Panzer Grenadier Regiment, w<strong>as</strong> heavily<br />
reinforced by mobile flak pieces, mor-<br />
tars, machine guns, and <strong>as</strong>sault artillery.<br />
<strong>To</strong> bre<strong>as</strong>t this heavy fire and rush the<br />
four hundred yards of open terrain, the<br />
two companies attacked in four waves at<br />
intervals of about fifty yards. The mo-<br />
ment the leading American <strong>as</strong>sault waves<br />
could be discerned through the darkness<br />
the enemy opened an intense, accurate<br />
fire. Twice the attackers were driven<br />
back, both times with gaping ranks. The<br />
first two waves were almost completely<br />
shot down. Company C ran into the wire<br />
and, having no wire cutters available,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> stalled momentarily. Finally the two<br />
tank destroyers worked their way to the<br />
front and began to shell the German<br />
guns. With their support a third <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
w<strong>as</strong> thrown at the village. This time a<br />
few men lived to reach the outlying<br />
houses. In a brief engagement at close<br />
quarters the Americans silenced some of<br />
the flak and machine guns, then set up a<br />
defense to guard this slight toehold until<br />
reinforcements could arrive.<br />
The West Flank of the XVIII<br />
Airborne Corps, 20 December<br />
The general advance of the XVIII Air-<br />
borne Corps on 20 December included<br />
the mission <strong>as</strong>signed to the 3d Armored<br />
Division of securing the B<strong>as</strong>togne-Liège<br />
highway between Manhay and Houffa-<br />
lize, thus screening the right or western<br />
flank of the corps. The bulk of the 3d<br />
Armored w<strong>as</strong> engaged elsew<strong>here</strong>: CCA<br />
deployed <strong>as</strong> a defense for the Eupen<br />
area, CCB driving with troops of the
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 353<br />
30th Infantry Division against Kampf-<br />
gruppe Peiper. When General Rose<br />
moved his forward command post to<br />
Hotton on 20 December, the residue of<br />
the 3d Armored w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembling between<br />
Hotton and Soy, a force numbering only<br />
the small reserve combat command and<br />
the 83d Reconnaissance Battalion.<br />
Nothing w<strong>as</strong> known of any friendly<br />
troops to the front, nor did information<br />
on the location and strength of the<br />
enemy have more than the validity of<br />
rumor. Since it w<strong>as</strong> necessary to recon-<br />
noiter and clear the area west of the<br />
important section of the north-south<br />
highway, now his objective, General<br />
Rose decided to divide his limited<br />
strength into three columns, two attack-<br />
ing via generally north-south routes and<br />
then swinging e<strong>as</strong>tward: the third, on<br />
the extreme left, driving e<strong>as</strong>t to the<br />
Manhay crossroads and then turning<br />
south on the main highway.<br />
This w<strong>as</strong> a risky decision, <strong>as</strong> the 3d<br />
Armored commander well knew, for the<br />
zone of attack w<strong>as</strong> very broad and if one<br />
of the small columns ran into a superior<br />
enemy force the best it could do would<br />
be to fight a delaying action on its own.<br />
Terrain and weather, however, would<br />
aid the reconnaissance somewhat, for al-<br />
though the area w<strong>as</strong> laced by back roads<br />
and trails German maneuver would be<br />
dr<strong>as</strong>tically curtailed and a German ad-<br />
vance limited to the few open and p<strong>as</strong>s-<br />
able roads. General Rose tried to retain<br />
<strong>as</strong> much flexibility <strong>as</strong> he could, in view<br />
of the vague status of the enemy and the<br />
width of the front to be covered. The<br />
three t<strong>as</strong>k forces, or more properly recon-<br />
naissance teams, <strong>as</strong>signed to Lt. Col.<br />
Prentice E. Yeomans each had a recon-<br />
naissance troop, a medium tank com-<br />
pany, a battery-of armored field artillery,<br />
and a platoon of light tanks. The re-<br />
serve, commanded by Col. Robert L.<br />
Howze, Jr., w<strong>as</strong> made up of an armored<br />
infantry battalion, two companies of<br />
light tanks and one of mediums, plus a<br />
company of engineers. This reserve<br />
would follow the middle t<strong>as</strong>k force.<br />
The attack or reconnaissance, time<br />
would tell which, began in early after-<br />
noon. On the right T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hogan<br />
(Lt. Col. Samuel M. Hogan) set out<br />
along a secondary road surmounting the<br />
ridge which rose on the e<strong>as</strong>t bank of the<br />
Ourthe River and extended south to La<br />
Roche, the boundary for the XVIII Air-<br />
borne Corps right wing. The Ourthe<br />
River, then, would form a natural screen<br />
on this flank. Hogan's column met no<br />
opposition en route to La Roche and up-<br />
on arrival t<strong>here</strong> found that the town w<strong>as</strong><br />
defended by roadblocks that had been<br />
thrown up by the 7th Armored Division<br />
trains. At this point the route dropped<br />
into the river valley, following the twists<br />
and turns of the Ourthe toward the<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t. Hogan sent on a small scout-<br />
ing force which covered some three miles<br />
before it w<strong>as</strong> confronted by a German<br />
roadblock. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no way around,<br />
daylight w<strong>as</strong> running out, and the force<br />
hal t ed .<br />
The road <strong>as</strong>signed T<strong>as</strong>k Force Tucker<br />
(Maj. John Tucker), the center column,<br />
followed the Aisne River valley south-<br />
ward. At the village of Dochamps this<br />
route began an <strong>as</strong>cent from the valley<br />
onto the ridge or tableland w<strong>here</strong> lay<br />
the town of Samrée. At Samrée T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Tucker w<strong>as</strong> to make a left wheel<br />
onto the La Roche-Salmchâteau road<br />
(N28), which followed a high, narrow<br />
ridge line to the e<strong>as</strong>t, t<strong>here</strong> crossing the<br />
main Liège-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway. This in-<br />
tersection, the Baraque de Fraiture,
354 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
would have a special importance in later<br />
fighting.<br />
Tucker’s column moved unopposed<br />
through the Aisne valley but at<br />
Dochamps, w<strong>here</strong> began the <strong>as</strong>cent to<br />
the Samrée highland, it w<strong>as</strong> engaged by<br />
a German force of unknown strength.<br />
In an attempt to continue the reconnais-<br />
sance Major Tucker split his command<br />
in three. One force circled west and<br />
south to Samrée w<strong>here</strong>, it had only now<br />
been learned, a part of the 7th Armored<br />
Division trains w<strong>as</strong> fighting to hold the<br />
town. The second group turned e<strong>as</strong>t and<br />
finally made contact with T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Kane. Tucker’s third group moved back<br />
north to Amonines.<br />
Late in the afternoon General Rose<br />
learned that the 3d Armored tanks sent<br />
to Samrée had been knocked out and the<br />
town itself lost to the enemy. The eleva-<br />
tion on which Samrée stood and its im-<br />
portance <strong>as</strong> a barrier on the highway<br />
from La Roche to the division objective<br />
made recapture of the town almost man-<br />
datory. Rose ordered Colonel Yeomans<br />
to regain Samrée and hold it; for this<br />
mission two companies of armored infan-<br />
try from the reserve combat command<br />
were detailed to Lt. Col. William R.<br />
Orr. Colonel Orr picked up the remain-<br />
ing elements of T<strong>as</strong>k Force Tucker and<br />
arrived outside of Dochamps a little be-<br />
fore midnight, setting up a roadblock for<br />
the remainder of the night.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Kane (Lt. Col. Matthew<br />
W. Kane), on the left in the three-<br />
column advance, found e<strong>as</strong>y going on 20<br />
December. Acting <strong>as</strong> the pivot for the<br />
swing south and e<strong>as</strong>t, Kane’s column w<strong>as</strong><br />
charged with the occupation of Malem-<br />
pré, about 3,000 yards southe<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
vital Manhay crossroads. This latter<br />
junction on the Liège-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway<br />
represented a position tactically unten-<br />
able. Hills away to the e<strong>as</strong>t and west<br />
dominated the village, and to the south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t an extensive woods promised cover<br />
from which the enemy could bring fire<br />
on the crossroads. By re<strong>as</strong>on of the<br />
ground, t<strong>here</strong>fore, Malempré, on a hill<br />
beyond the woods, w<strong>as</strong> the chosen ob-<br />
jective. Kane’s t<strong>as</strong>k force reached Man-<br />
hay and pushed advance elements <strong>as</strong> far<br />
<strong>as</strong> Malempré without meeting the en-<br />
emy.<br />
The three reconnaissance forces of the<br />
3d Armored Division by the close of 20<br />
December had accomplished a part of<br />
their mission by discovering the general<br />
direction of the German advance north-<br />
west of Houffalize and, on two of the<br />
three roads, had made contact with the<br />
enemy. It remained to establish the en-<br />
emy’s strength and his immediate inten-<br />
tions. As yet no prisoners had been taken<br />
nor precise identifications secured, but<br />
the G–2 of the 3d Armored Division (Lt.<br />
Col. Andrew Barr) made a guess, b<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
on earlier reports, that the three t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
forces had met the 116th Panzer Division<br />
and that the 560th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> following the former <strong>as</strong> support.<br />
Action in Front of the XVIII<br />
Airborne Corps Right Wing on<br />
20 December<br />
As the 3d Armored Division <strong>as</strong>sembled<br />
for advance on the morning of 20 Decem-<br />
ber, and indeed for most of the day, it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> unaware that little groups of Amer-<br />
icans continued to hold roadblocks and<br />
delay the enemy in the area lying to the<br />
front of the XVIII Airborne Corps right<br />
wing. These miniature delaying posi-<br />
tions had been formed on 18 and 19<br />
December by men belonging to the 7th
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 355<br />
Armored Division trains, commanded by<br />
Colonel Adams, and by two combat en-<br />
gineer battalions, the 51st and 158th. As<br />
the 7th Armored advanced into combat<br />
around St. Vith on 18 December and it<br />
became apparent that German thrusts<br />
were piercing deep on both flanks of this<br />
position, Adams received orders to move<br />
the division trains into the area around<br />
La Roche and prepare a defense for that<br />
town and the Ourthe bridges. Most of<br />
the vehicles under Adams’ command<br />
were concentrated west of La Roche by<br />
MAP 3<br />
20 December, but large stores of ammu-<br />
nition, rations, and g<strong>as</strong>oline had just<br />
been moved to dumps at Samrée. (Map<br />
3) The 51st Engineer Combat Battalion<br />
(Lt. Col. Harvey R. Fr<strong>as</strong>er) had arrived<br />
at Hotton on 19 December with orders<br />
to construct a barrier line farther south<br />
which would utilize the Ourthe River <strong>as</strong><br />
a natural obstacle. The battalion w<strong>as</strong> mi-<br />
nus Company C, which, at Trois Ponts,<br />
did much to slow the pace of Kampf-<br />
gruppe Peiper’s westward march. It did<br />
H.C. Brewer, Jr.
356 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
have the services of the 9th Canadian<br />
Forestry Company, which took on the<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k of preparing the Ourthe crossings<br />
south of La Roche for demolition. From<br />
La Roche north to Hotton and for several<br />
kilometers beyond, the remaining<br />
two companies worked at mining p<strong>as</strong>sable<br />
fording sites, fixing explosives on<br />
bridges, and erecting roadblocks; but<br />
the extensive project w<strong>as</strong> far from com-,<br />
plete on 20 December. The sketchy barrier<br />
line on the Ourthe w<strong>as</strong> extended<br />
toward B<strong>as</strong>togne by the 158th Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion. 11 <strong>To</strong> the 7th Armored<br />
trains and the engineers were added little<br />
groups of heterogeneous composition<br />
and improvised armament, picked up by<br />
the nearest headquarters and hurried’ to<br />
the Ourthe River line in answer to<br />
rumors of the German advance over<br />
Houffalize. It is hardly surprising, then,<br />
that the 3d Armored Division began its<br />
advance unaware of efforts already afoot<br />
to delay the enemy.<br />
While little American detachments<br />
worked feverishly to prepare some kind<br />
of barrier line on the Ourthe River and<br />
around La Roche and Samrée, the north<br />
wing of the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
coming closer and closer. Krueger’s<br />
LVIII Panzer Corps pushed its advance<br />
guard through the Houffalize area on 19<br />
December, while the rear guard mopped<br />
up American stragglers and isolated detachments<br />
on the west bank of the Our<br />
River. Krueger’s orders were to push <strong>as</strong><br />
far west <strong>as</strong> possible on the axis Houffalize-La<br />
Roche while his neighbor on the<br />
left, the XXXVII Panzer Corps, cut its<br />
11 The combat operations of these engineer<br />
battalions would have some effect on the German<br />
advance against the western wing of the XVIII<br />
Airborne Corps, but since they are integral to<br />
the VIII Corps defense they constitute part of<br />
that story. See above, Chapter XIII.<br />
way through B<strong>as</strong>togne or circled p<strong>as</strong>t<br />
the road complex centered t<strong>here</strong>.<br />
The Reconnaissance Battalion of the<br />
116th Panzer Division, several hours<br />
ahead of the main body of Krueger’s<br />
corps, had reached Houffalize on the<br />
morning of 19 December, but because<br />
Krueger expected the town to be strong-<br />
ly defended and had ordered his recon-<br />
naissance to avoid a fight t<strong>here</strong> the<br />
battalion veered to the south, then west<br />
toward La Roche. This brief enemy<br />
apparition and sudden disappearance<br />
near Houffalize probably account for the<br />
conflicting and confusing rumors <strong>as</strong> to<br />
the location of the Germans in this sec-<br />
tor which were current in American<br />
headquarters on 19 December. Between<br />
Bertogne and La Roche the Recon-<br />
naissance Battalion discovered that the<br />
bridge over the west branch of the<br />
Ourthe had been destroyed. At this<br />
point the Germans had a brush with one<br />
of the roadblocks put out by the 7th<br />
Armored troops in La Roche and thus<br />
alerted Colonel Adams. 12 Adams had no<br />
other information of the enemy.<br />
It seemed to Adams, <strong>as</strong> a result of the<br />
skirmish, that the German advance to-<br />
ward La Roche w<strong>as</strong> being made on the<br />
northwest bank of the main branch of<br />
the Ourthe River and that the final at-<br />
tack would come from the west rather<br />
than the e<strong>as</strong>t. He t<strong>here</strong>fore moved the<br />
7th Armored dumps from locations west<br />
of La Roche to Samrée, from which<br />
point he hoped to maintain contact with<br />
and continue supplies to the main body<br />
of the division at St. Vith. By early morn-<br />
ing of 20 December the transfer had<br />
12<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> unusual during World War II for the<br />
division trains to keep a special narrative journal,<br />
but the 7th Armored did keep one that h<strong>as</strong> proven<br />
a gold mine for this section.
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 357<br />
been completed. Adams now w<strong>as</strong> con-<br />
fronted with the necessity of pushing his<br />
defenses farther e<strong>as</strong>t to protect the new<br />
supply point. He dispatched part of a<br />
battery of the 203d Antiaircraft Artillery<br />
Battalion to the Baraque de Fraiture<br />
crossroads formed by the intersection of<br />
the Samrée-Salmchateau road and the<br />
main Liège-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway, the same<br />
junction which had seemed so important<br />
to the XVIII Airborne Corps com-<br />
mander in his map reconnaissance of this<br />
area. Upon arrival t<strong>here</strong> the newcomers<br />
found that some gunners from the 106th<br />
Infantry Division, commanded by Maj.<br />
Arthur C. Parker, already had dug in to<br />
defend the vital crossroads.<br />
The German appearance at the bro-<br />
ken bridge which altered Colonel<br />
Adams’ plans had even greater effect in<br />
General Krueger’s headquarters. Krue-<br />
ger had no bridging available in the<br />
corps trains when the word reached him<br />
on the night of the 19th. The fact that<br />
he had to rely on the limited capacity of<br />
the 116th Panzer Division engineers<br />
meant that the western branch of the<br />
Ourthe could not be spanned before the<br />
evening of 20 December. Such a delay<br />
w<strong>as</strong> out of the question. <strong>To</strong> sidestep to<br />
the south would bang the corps against<br />
very strong resistance forming around<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne and would scramble the vehic-<br />
ular columns of Krueger’s armor with<br />
the 2d Panzer Division. By this time the<br />
116th Panzer Division rear guard had<br />
occupied Houffalize without a fight. The<br />
main body of the division, having<br />
marched unopposed nearly to the road<br />
which runs from B<strong>as</strong>togne northwest to<br />
Marche, w<strong>as</strong> preparing to seize a second<br />
bridge over the west branch of the<br />
Ourthe at Ortheuville. Krueger had no<br />
faith that any stroke of fortune would<br />
deliver the Ourtheuville bridge untouched.<br />
This w<strong>as</strong> the end of the fourth<br />
day of the German advance and the<br />
Americans, he re<strong>as</strong>oned, were long since<br />
on guard against a coup de main t<strong>here</strong>.<br />
Weighing the apparent American<br />
strength in the B<strong>as</strong>togne sector against<br />
the total absence of resistance at Houffalize<br />
the LVIII Panzer Corps commander<br />
decided, late in the evening of the<br />
19th, to shift his advance to the north<br />
bank of the Ourthe River and reroute<br />
the 116th Panzer Division toward Samrée<br />
by way of Houffalize. The order to halt<br />
his division and countermarch to Houffalize<br />
w<strong>as</strong> a distinctly unple<strong>as</strong>ant experience<br />
for General von Waldenburg. (He<br />
would later say that his decision w<strong>as</strong><br />
“fatal to the division.”) The business of<br />
reversing a mechanized division in full<br />
swing under conditions of total darkness<br />
is ticklish at best; when it is conducted<br />
by tired officers and men unfamiliar with<br />
the road net and is hampered by supply<br />
and artillery trains backing up behind<br />
the turning columns it is a serious test<br />
for any unit. Nevertheless the 116th<br />
sorted itself out, issued supplies, refueled<br />
its vehicles, and by early morning w<strong>as</strong><br />
en route to Houffalize. Meanwhile the<br />
1128th Regiment, leading the 560th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division, had been<br />
closing up f<strong>as</strong>t on the 116th Panzer Division<br />
in a series of forced marches (that<br />
later won for the 560th a commendation<br />
for its “excellent march performance”) .<br />
By noon of 20 December the bulk of the<br />
116th Panzer Division followed by a<br />
large portion of the 560th Yolks Grenadier<br />
Division had defiled through Houffalize<br />
and w<strong>as</strong> on the north bank of the<br />
Ourthe River. 13<br />
13 The German sources for other units than<br />
Kampfgruppe Peiper include: MSS ETHINT-21
358 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
The maneuver now to be executed w<strong>as</strong><br />
a left wheel into attack against Samrée<br />
and La Roche, with the main effort,<br />
carried by the tank regiment of the<br />
116th Panzer Division, made at Samrée.<br />
The right flank of the attack would be<br />
covered by the 560th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division. As the morning drew along the<br />
Americans had made their presence felt<br />
by incre<strong>as</strong>ingly effective artillery fire<br />
from the north. German scouts reported<br />
that t<strong>here</strong> were tanks to be seen near<br />
Samrée (actually the American garrison<br />
t<strong>here</strong> had only one) but that the ground<br />
would sustain a German tank attack.<br />
The 60th Panzer Grenadier Regiment<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembled under cover of the woods<br />
south of the town, and the tanks (from<br />
the 16th Panzer Regiment) moved out<br />
onto the Samrée road. Advance patrols,<br />
which had started a fire fight in the late<br />
morning, were able to occupy a few<br />
houses when a fog settled in shortly after<br />
noon.<br />
All this time the 7th Armored Division<br />
quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter, Lt. Col. A. A. Miller,<br />
had been issuing rations, ammuni-<br />
tion, and g<strong>as</strong>oline <strong>as</strong> f<strong>as</strong>t <strong>as</strong> trucks<br />
could load. The force he had inside<br />
Samrée w<strong>as</strong> small: half of the 3967th<br />
Quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter Truck Company, the<br />
quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter section of the division<br />
headquarters, part of the 440th Ar-<br />
mored Field Artillery Battalion’s Service<br />
Battery, two sections of D Battery, 203d<br />
Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion, armed<br />
with quadruple-mount machine guns,<br />
plus a light tank and a half-track from<br />
the 87th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squad-<br />
(Kraemer) , and ETHINT-34, OKW, Ardennes<br />
<strong>Of</strong>fensive (Maj. Herbert Buecks); MSS A–873<br />
(Waldenburg) ; A–924 (Kraemer) ; A–955 (Ding<br />
ler) ; B–027 (Langhaeuser) ; B–321 (Krueger); B-<br />
506 (Triepel) .<br />
ron. About noon word reached Samrée<br />
that the 3d Armored Division w<strong>as</strong> send-<br />
ing a t<strong>as</strong>k force to the town. The Ger-<br />
man patrols had not yet entered the<br />
town; so, heartened by the approach of<br />
the friendly armor, Miller gave orders<br />
that no supplies were to be destroyed.<br />
About 1430 the fire fight quickened.<br />
Hearing that the 3d Armored tanks had<br />
reached Dochamps, Miller drove to find<br />
the t<strong>as</strong>k force and insure that he would<br />
get immediate aid. Not more than a half<br />
hour later the Germans swarmed in un-<br />
der a sharp barrage of rocket fire. By<br />
this time the one tank w<strong>as</strong> out of ammu-<br />
nition, the machine gunners manning<br />
the .50-caliber weapons on the quarter-<br />
m<strong>as</strong>ter trucks were also running low, the<br />
antiaircraft outfit had lost three of its<br />
weapons and fired its l<strong>as</strong>t round, and the<br />
division Cl<strong>as</strong>s III officer had ordered the<br />
units to evacuate. A majority of the<br />
troops got out with most of their trucks<br />
and the remaining artillery ammunition,<br />
but 15,000 rations and 25,000 gallons of<br />
g<strong>as</strong>oline were left behind.<br />
Shortly after, the detachment sent<br />
from T<strong>as</strong>k Force Tucker appeared. Two<br />
armored cars, at the point, entered the<br />
north edge of the town, but the six<br />
medium tanks following were quickly<br />
destroyed by German armor coming in<br />
from the e<strong>as</strong>t. During the shooting the<br />
armored cars were able to pick up the<br />
surviving tankers and escape to La<br />
Roche. The 7th Armored Division head-<br />
quarters received word of the fight, and<br />
from La Roche the commander of the<br />
Trains Headquarters Company, 1st. Lt.<br />
Denniston Averill, hurried to Samrée<br />
with two medium tanks and a self-<br />
propelled tank destroyer. Averill’s little<br />
party attempted to enter Samrée, but<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not heard from again.
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 359<br />
<strong>Of</strong>f to the e<strong>as</strong>t, at Salmchâteau, Troop<br />
D of the 87th Cavalry Reconnaissance<br />
Squadron also got orders sending it to<br />
Samrée. P<strong>as</strong>sing the friendly outpost at<br />
the Baraque de Fraiture the troop came<br />
within two and a half miles of Samrée<br />
when it encountered a German road-<br />
block, not well defended. Sm<strong>as</strong>hing it,<br />
the troop moved on. Shortly it struck a<br />
second block formed by abandoned<br />
American trucks and defended by a<br />
large force of German infantry (two<br />
companies of the 560th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division). Having felt out the enemy<br />
and with night drawing on, the cavalry<br />
commander pulled his troop back a little<br />
to the e<strong>as</strong>t to await the morning. Later in<br />
the evening radio orders came from the<br />
7th Armored Division headquarters tell-<br />
ing him to arrange a co-ordinated attack<br />
with the 3d Armored Division t<strong>as</strong>k force<br />
north of Dochamps.<br />
The action at Samrée had delayed<br />
Krueger’s corps considerably. But the<br />
g<strong>as</strong>oline stores captured t<strong>here</strong> had re-<br />
fueled all the vehicles of the 116th Pan-<br />
zer Division; despite <strong>as</strong>surances by Amer-<br />
ican prisoners that sugar had been mixed<br />
with the g<strong>as</strong>oline the enemy drivers re-<br />
ported that it suited the German motors<br />
very well.<br />
The Net Closes on Peiper<br />
General Hobbs’s division and CCB, 3d<br />
Armored Division, had a job to do before<br />
the XVIII Airborne Corps could be free<br />
to direct all its strength into a drive to<br />
re-establish contact with the VIII Corps<br />
and close the gap between Houffalize<br />
and B<strong>as</strong>togne. Kampfgruppe Peiper, esti-<br />
mated <strong>as</strong> comprising at le<strong>as</strong>t half of the<br />
1st SS Panzer Division, had to be eradi-<br />
cated north of the Amblève River. This<br />
force, whose rapid drive to the west had<br />
caused such alarm only a few hours be-<br />
fore, appeared to be pocketed in the<br />
Stoumont-La Gleize sector. Effectively<br />
blocked off on the west the trapped Ger-<br />
mans would probably try to cut their<br />
way to the rear via Stavelot or at le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
establish a bridgehead t<strong>here</strong> <strong>as</strong> a po-<br />
tential escape hatch. Probably, too, the<br />
troops in the pocket would receive some<br />
aid from new’ German units moving<br />
along the north flank of the St. Vith sali-<br />
ent through the gap between Malmédy<br />
and Recht.<br />
The operations designed for 21 De-<br />
cember left the 30th Division and its re-<br />
inforcing armor to finish off Peiper by<br />
tightening the net spread the day before.<br />
T<strong>here</strong>after the 30th had orders to link<br />
up with the 82d Airborne at Trois Ponts<br />
and prepare to join in the XVIII Air-<br />
borne Corps advance by pushing south.<br />
The varied indications that the Germans<br />
were moving in some force toward<br />
Malmédy, the pivot point for both the<br />
corps and division left wing, seemed to<br />
be no re<strong>as</strong>on for reverting strictly to<br />
the defensive. Malmédy had been pre-<br />
pared for defense since the scare of 17<br />
December, the reports of enemy forces<br />
t<strong>here</strong>abouts were rather vague, and six<br />
American artillery battalions were in<br />
position to give support w<strong>here</strong> needed.<br />
In detail, then, the plans prepared by<br />
Hobbs and his staff were formulated<br />
against the Germans in the pocket.<br />
On the morning of 21 December the<br />
American forces in and around Malmédy<br />
were substantial: the 120th Infantry<br />
(minus a battalion in division reserve) ;<br />
the “Norwegians,” that is, the 99th In-<br />
fantry Battalion; the 526th Armored In-<br />
fantry Battalion; a company from the<br />
291st Engineer Battalion; a tank com-
360 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
MINED BRIDGE IN MALMEDY. Tapes mark safe p<strong>as</strong>sageway.<br />
pany from the 740th; and two platoons<br />
from the 823d Tank Destroyer Battal-<br />
ion. 14 The American infantry line<br />
formed an arc south of the town, swing-<br />
ing to e<strong>as</strong>t and west. On the left this<br />
line touched the 1st Infantry Division<br />
outposts near Waimes; on the right it<br />
had a tenuous connection with the 117th<br />
Infantry at the junction of the road<br />
from Stavelot and the road running<br />
north to Francorchamps. In p<strong>as</strong>sing it<br />
must be said that the responsibilities of<br />
14 <strong>History</strong> of the 120th Infantry Regiment and<br />
H. R. Bergen, <strong>History</strong> of 99th Infantry Battalion<br />
(Oslo, n.d.); also 120th Inf AAR. The story of<br />
other detachments in the Malmèdy fight is told in<br />
12th <strong>Army</strong> Group, Special Forces, AAR, December<br />
1944.<br />
the two sister regiments at the vaguely<br />
defined interregimental boundary were<br />
none too explicit. All roads leading to<br />
Malmèdy had been blocked by mines<br />
and barricades or were barred by out-<br />
post detachments.<br />
The first action of 21 December, <strong>as</strong><br />
it turned out, w<strong>as</strong> neither against Peiper<br />
nor at the pocket, but an engagement<br />
at Malmèdy with new German troops<br />
thus far unidentified <strong>as</strong> a regular tactical<br />
unit. The night before, an enemy force<br />
had <strong>as</strong>sembled in Ligneuville, five miles<br />
south of Malmèdy. This w<strong>as</strong> the noto-<br />
rious 150th Panzer Brigade which, under<br />
the command of the equally notorious<br />
Colonel Skorzeny, had been especially<br />
trained to seize the Meuse bridges <strong>as</strong>
‘THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 361<br />
a part of Operation Greif. When<br />
the German plans to reach the Hohes<br />
Venn on the second day of the counter-<br />
offensive miscarried and the regular<br />
German formations were checked so far<br />
from the Meuse <strong>as</strong> to make a d<strong>as</strong>h by<br />
this special t<strong>as</strong>k force out of the question,<br />
Colonel Skorzeny sought for some other<br />
road to fame and glory. His recommen-<br />
dation, made to the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
commander, that the group be re-<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembled and committed <strong>as</strong> an ordinary<br />
combat unit w<strong>as</strong> accepted, and the cap-<br />
ture of Malmédy w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed <strong>as</strong> its first<br />
mission.<br />
The troops that gat<strong>here</strong>d in Ligneu-<br />
ville must have made a motley crew.<br />
Some were completely equipped with<br />
American uniforms and dog-tags; others<br />
had olive drab trousers and American<br />
combat boots surmounted by field gray<br />
tunics; still ,others wore the German<br />
field uniform. Their vehicles were an<br />
<strong>as</strong>sortment of German makes; captured<br />
American armored cars, tanks, and<br />
jeeps; and German models which had<br />
been given a face-lifting job by the<br />
addition of dummy turrets, decks, and<br />
fronts to simulate an American equiva-<br />
lent. Despite this rag-tag appearance<br />
Skorzeny’s command w<strong>as</strong> composed of<br />
tough, picked men, abundantly armed<br />
with automatic and heavy weapons.<br />
Skorzeny divided his brigade into<br />
three groups, two for the <strong>as</strong>sault and<br />
one in reserve. About two hours before<br />
dawn the right group struck straight<br />
north along the Ligneuville road in an<br />
effort to seize the bridge south of Mal-<br />
médy. The <strong>as</strong>sault force w<strong>as</strong> engaged by<br />
the 1st Battalion of the 120th Infantry,<br />
and the 3d Battalion joined the fire fight<br />
<strong>as</strong> well; but it w<strong>as</strong> left to the artillery<br />
to “pl<strong>as</strong>ter” the Germans, <strong>as</strong> the in-<br />
fantry were quick to acknowledge. Two<br />
hours later the attackers had disap-<br />
peared. The morning came with a dense<br />
fog floating out from the Amblève River.<br />
Attacking under this cover the left Ger-<br />
man <strong>as</strong>sault group, two rifle companies,<br />
and a tank company rolled in column<br />
along a secondary road which would<br />
bring it west of Malmédy against the<br />
3d Battalion of the 120th. One detach-<br />
ment turned toward the town but came<br />
to a sudden halt when the lead vehicles<br />
hit a mine field in front of B Company,<br />
99th Infantry Battalion. It took only<br />
minutes for mortars, machine guns, and<br />
artillery to dispel this <strong>as</strong>sault.<br />
Here, on the first day of use of the<br />
new POZIT fuze, the Germans were<br />
roughly dealt with. Nearly a hundred<br />
were killed by the shellbursts and for<br />
a moment panic spread among them,<br />
some running forward into the fire shout-<br />
ing “Kamerad.” But Skorzeny’s troops<br />
were tough and tried repeatedly to break<br />
Lt. Col. Harold D. Hansen’s “Nor-<br />
wegians,” an outfit characterized in the<br />
German intelligence reports <strong>as</strong> “old<br />
men.” German machine gun crews tried<br />
to set up their pieces right in front of<br />
the railroad embankment w<strong>here</strong> B Com-<br />
pany lay but were shot down or bl<strong>as</strong>ted<br />
by hand grenades. Several times the<br />
enemy infantry reached the foot of the<br />
embankment, but could go no farther.<br />
Finally the <strong>as</strong>sault died down.<br />
The main enemy detachment headed<br />
for the Malmedy-Stavelot road, pushing<br />
its infantry to the fore. In the fog it en-<br />
countered K Company of the 120th In-<br />
fantry, knocked out a platoon deployed<br />
at a roadblock, and, using its tanks,<br />
drove the remaining American infantry<br />
back some distance to the north. Four<br />
3-inch towed tank destroyers covering the
362<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
GERMAN TANK DISGUISED AS AN AMERICAN TANK<br />
road were abandoned after their crews<br />
removed the firing pins.<br />
Not all the Americans fell back, how-<br />
ever. One who stayed w<strong>as</strong> 1st Lt.<br />
Kenneth R. Nelson, who decided to hold<br />
on with a few men left in his section<br />
and did so, savagely beating back the<br />
attackers. Nelson led the fight until he<br />
died of the wounds he had suffered. He<br />
received the DSC posthumously. T/Sgt.<br />
John Van Der Kamp then took com-<br />
mand, although wounded, and held the<br />
position until ordered to withdraw. He<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC. Part of K Com-<br />
pany withdrew to a nearby factory, w<strong>here</strong><br />
Pfc. Francis Currey essayed a series of<br />
gallant deeds for which he later received<br />
the Medal of Honor. He knocked out<br />
a tank with bazooka fire, drove the Ger-<br />
man crews out of three tanks with anti-<br />
tank grenades, with a bazooka blew in<br />
the front of the house w<strong>here</strong> the enemy<br />
tankers had taken refuge, and turned a<br />
half-track machine gun on the house<br />
with such effect <strong>as</strong> to silence the German<br />
fire and permit the escape of five Amer-<br />
icans who had been cornered by the<br />
enemy.<br />
This confused fight in the fog, taking<br />
place <strong>as</strong> it did on the boundary be-
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 363<br />
tween the 120th and the 117th, had re-<br />
percussions out of all relation to the<br />
event. By noon garbled reports and<br />
rumors placed German tanks (errone-<br />
ously <strong>as</strong> it proved) in villages northwest<br />
of Malmédy; the 117th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> wor-<br />
ried that the Germans were left free to<br />
strike their left flank at Stavelot; the<br />
staff of the 120th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> trying<br />
desperately to find out exactly what had<br />
happened; two battalions of antiaircraft<br />
artillery with 90-mm. guns were hurried-<br />
ly taking positions to build a defense in<br />
depth <strong>as</strong> far back <strong>as</strong> the division com-<br />
mand post; the 120th Infantry reserve<br />
w<strong>as</strong> rushed west to Burnenville–but<br />
found no Germans. The much-touted<br />
German penetration finally boiled down<br />
to one tank and a half-track which had<br />
driven up and down the road in the fog<br />
with an English-speaking soldier shout-<br />
ing out lurid promises of warm female<br />
companionship for the Americans if they<br />
only would surrender.<br />
The German thrust along the<br />
boundary between the two American<br />
regiments, <strong>as</strong> the event showed, had be-<br />
come jammed in the narrow corridor<br />
and most of its armor destroyed by cross<br />
fire coming in from the flanks. Deprived<br />
of tank support and followed unrelent-<br />
ingly by the new variety of shellbursts,<br />
the enemy infantry had withdrawn.<br />
Skorzeny, by this time fully aware of the<br />
defending strength at Malmédy, or-<br />
dered his brigade to pull back to the<br />
south. Thus ended the first and the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
attack on Malmédy. The lines of the 3d<br />
Battalion were restored and two of the<br />
abandoned tank destroyer guns recov-<br />
ered and placed in action. Nonetheless,<br />
the unexpected strength of the German<br />
attack on Malmédy had impacts all up<br />
and down the American chain of com-<br />
mand. At Hodges’ First <strong>Army</strong> head-<br />
quarters t<strong>here</strong> had been a continuing<br />
question <strong>as</strong> to whether the enemy would<br />
try to shake loose in the north and drive<br />
for Liège. Momentarily it looked <strong>as</strong> if<br />
this indeed w<strong>as</strong> the German intention.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the west at Stavelot, a detachment<br />
from the rearward march echelons of<br />
the 1st SS Panzer Division made an<br />
abortive attempt to cross to the north<br />
bank of the Amblève preparatory to<br />
reopening the route leading to Kampf-<br />
gruppe Peiper. The Americans holding<br />
the major section of the town had blown<br />
the l<strong>as</strong>t bridge, and the panzer grena-<br />
diers were forced to take to the icy<br />
stream. This crossing brought a hundred<br />
or so of the <strong>as</strong>sault force in front of<br />
B Company, 117th Infantry, whose rifle-<br />
men picked off most of the attackers<br />
while they still were in the stream. Be-<br />
yond this one alarm the day p<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
quietly at Stavelot–although one major<br />
dis<strong>as</strong>ter occurred when a section of the<br />
743d Tank Battalion fired high explosive<br />
into a building and set it afire, only to<br />
learn that it w<strong>as</strong> filled with champagne<br />
and cognac.<br />
The march echelons of the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division en route to relieve<br />
Peiper were slow in <strong>as</strong>sembling and their<br />
concentration area, southe<strong>as</strong>t of Stave-<br />
lot, w<strong>as</strong> under constant interdiction by<br />
artillery fire. The 1st SS Panzer troops<br />
trapped to the west were closely engaged,<br />
and <strong>as</strong> yet Peiper had no orders which<br />
would permit a retrograde movement.<br />
On the American side the skirmish at<br />
Stavelot, coupled with German counter-<br />
attacks in the La Gleize-Stoumont sec-<br />
tor, made for bewilderment. General<br />
Hobbs dryly stated the prevailing<br />
opinion on the intentions of the trapped<br />
enemy, “They are trying to get out
364 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
forward or backward or something.”<br />
The main t<strong>as</strong>k for the 30th Division<br />
and its reinforcing armored t<strong>as</strong>k forces<br />
remained that of eradicating all German<br />
troops north of the Amblève. The<br />
general plan w<strong>as</strong> a continuation of the<br />
one set in operation the day before: the<br />
119th Infantry (reinforced) , now or-<br />
ganized under the <strong>as</strong>sistant division com-<br />
mander, General Harrison, <strong>as</strong> T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Harrison, to capture Stoumont and<br />
continue its e<strong>as</strong>tward drive <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> La<br />
Gleize; the 3d Battalion of the 117th<br />
Infantry (reinforced) and the two 3d<br />
Armored t<strong>as</strong>k forces to carry through the<br />
concentric attack to seize La Gleize.<br />
The latter maneuver got under way on<br />
21 December. T<strong>as</strong>k Force Lovelady,<br />
which had cut south between Stavelot<br />
and La Gleize on the previous day, re-<br />
versed its course and moved north from<br />
the Trois Ponts area with the intention<br />
of securing the ridge which overlooked<br />
La Gleize from the southe<strong>as</strong>t. T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
McGeorge, stopped cold the evening be-<br />
fore on the narrow ridge road which<br />
angled to La Gleize from the north,<br />
resumed the attack with K Company,<br />
117th Infantry, trying to pry out the<br />
German block to the front. South of the<br />
Amblève, T<strong>as</strong>k Force Lovelady w<strong>as</strong><br />
screened by the low-hanging fog from<br />
the strong enemy patrols working<br />
through the area; on the north bank,<br />
however, it ran into trouble while ad-<br />
vancing on the sunken La Gleize road.<br />
Two leading tanks were crippled when<br />
they hit a patch of mines. Then German<br />
tanks or antitank guns knocked out the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t two tanks in the column. At this<br />
point, t<strong>here</strong>fore, the road w<strong>as</strong> effectively<br />
blocked against further American or<br />
future German counterattacks. The in-<br />
fantry with Lovelady and a tank com-<br />
pany spent the remainder of the day<br />
mopping up in the small villages along<br />
the river bank, finding evidences of re-<br />
volting atrocities earlier perpetrated on<br />
the defenseless Belgians by Peiper’s<br />
troops. Attempts to mount the ridge were<br />
checked by machine gun fire, and it be-<br />
came evident that the enemy had a<br />
strong force concentrated in this sector.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force McGeorge and riflemen of<br />
the 117th Infantry likewise were unable<br />
to make much headway in extending the<br />
northern arm of the planned envelop-<br />
ment. The German barrier interposed<br />
by dug-in tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns at a<br />
little stream about a thousand yards<br />
north of La Gleize could not be taken by<br />
maneuver, for McGeorge’s tanks were<br />
unable to get off the road, or by single-<br />
handed infantry <strong>as</strong>sault. The American<br />
column then drew back along the valley<br />
road. About a mile e<strong>as</strong>t of La Gleize<br />
the t<strong>as</strong>k force turned west to cross the<br />
valley and approach the town but w<strong>as</strong><br />
halted at a curve in the road by fire<br />
from dug-in tanks and antitank guns.<br />
The riflemen formed a line of skirmishers<br />
in front of the German block and the<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force halted for the night.<br />
The drive to pinch out the western<br />
contents of the Peiper pocket at Stou-<br />
mont got off to a late start on the 21st.<br />
General Harrison’s original plan called<br />
for a co-ordinated attack in the early<br />
morning. The 1st Battalion, 119th In-<br />
fantry, w<strong>as</strong> to continue the drive to enter<br />
the town from the west (after recaptur-<br />
ing the sanatorium and the high<br />
ground flanking the entrance). The 2d<br />
Battalion would swing wide through the<br />
woods north of the town, block the es-<br />
cape route to La Gleize, and then attack<br />
from the e<strong>as</strong>t. T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jordan and<br />
the reorganized 3d Battalion (which
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 365<br />
earlier had been thrown out of Stou-<br />
mont) would attack from the north <strong>as</strong><br />
soon <strong>as</strong> the sanatorium, which over-<br />
looked the northern entrance to the<br />
town <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> the western, w<strong>as</strong> wrested<br />
from enemy hands. The sanatorium,<br />
then, and the rise on which it stood<br />
held the final control of Stoumont.<br />
Peiper did not wait for the counter-<br />
attack which might lose him the<br />
sanatorium. Sometime before 0500 the<br />
lull which had succeeded the night of<br />
fierce fighting w<strong>as</strong> broken by a German<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault against the 1st Battalion posi-<br />
tions on the roadway west of the town.<br />
The road itself w<strong>as</strong> blocked by a tank<br />
platoon from the 740th Tank Battalion,<br />
the infantry dug in behind. The first<br />
tank facing the enemy fell to an anti-<br />
tank gun; in the darkness three more<br />
were set aflame by Panzerfausts in the<br />
hands of the infiltrating enemy infantry.<br />
The Germans were finally thrown back,<br />
but they had succeeded in disorganiz-<br />
ing the 1st Battalion to the point w<strong>here</strong><br />
General Harrison felt that his own at-<br />
tack would have to be postponed. The<br />
division commander agreed to Harrison’s<br />
proposal that the attack be launched<br />
at 1245 instead of 0730 <strong>as</strong> planned. In<br />
the meantime the regimental cannon<br />
company and the 197th Field Artillery<br />
Battalion set to work softening up the<br />
Germans.<br />
At the new hour the 1st and 2d Bat-<br />
talions jumped off. The 1st Battalion<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault drove the enemy infantry out of<br />
some of the sanatorium rooms, but when<br />
a heavy German tank moved in on the<br />
north side (w<strong>here</strong> it w<strong>as</strong> screened from<br />
the Americans) and started bl<strong>as</strong>ting<br />
through the windows the Americans<br />
withdrew under smoke cover laid down<br />
by friendly mortars. Although the 2d<br />
Battalion made some progress in its ad-<br />
vance through the woods the battalion<br />
commander, Major McCown, w<strong>as</strong> cap-<br />
tured while making a personal recon-<br />
naissance, and his troops fell back to<br />
their original position. The American<br />
tanks, unable to advance along the nar-<br />
row sunken road under the guns of the<br />
Panthers and Tigers, remained north of<br />
the town.<br />
A call from the division commander<br />
in late afternoon for “the real picture<br />
down t<strong>here</strong>” elicited a frankly pessimis-<br />
tic answer from General Harrison. Two<br />
battalions, the 1st and 3d, had been cut<br />
down and demoralized by earlier enemy<br />
counterattacks; they were “in pretty bad<br />
shape.” As to the armored detachment:<br />
“The trouble is the only places w<strong>here</strong><br />
tanks of any kind can operate are on<br />
two sunken roads. The Germans have<br />
big tanks, so tanks have been of no help<br />
to us.” Further, Harrison told Hobbs,<br />
he would advise against continuing the<br />
attack on the morrow: “That place<br />
[Stoumont] is very strong. I don’t think<br />
those troops we have now, without some<br />
improvement, can take the thing. That is<br />
my honest opinion. They are way down<br />
in strength. The trouble is that we can<br />
only get light artillery fire on the town,<br />
and the Germans can shoot at us with<br />
tank guns and we can’t get tanks to<br />
shoot back unless they come out and get<br />
hit.” 15 <strong>To</strong> this forthright opinion t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> little to add. General Hobbs<br />
cautioned Harrison to be on the lookout<br />
for a German attempt to break out dur-<br />
ing the night and head west, and told<br />
him that an attempt would be made<br />
to work out a scheme with General Ridg-<br />
way for an attack by the 82d Airborne<br />
15 30th Div telephone journal, 21 Dec 44.
366 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Division against the southern side of the<br />
Stoumont-La Gleize pocket.<br />
Earlier in the day Hobbs had <strong>as</strong>sured<br />
the corps commander that if the 82d<br />
Airborne cleared out the south bank of<br />
the Ambleve no further help would be<br />
needed. His request that evening for an<br />
attack by the 82d from the Trois Ponts<br />
sector came at a time when the situation<br />
along the entire corps front had dr<strong>as</strong>tically<br />
altered and in part deteriorated. 16<br />
<strong>To</strong> the south the XVIII Airborne Corps<br />
w<strong>as</strong> heavily engaged, the 7th Armored<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> being pushed out of the<br />
St. Vith salient, and even in the Trois<br />
Ponts area t<strong>here</strong> had been a sudden enemy<br />
resurgence. Furthermore a frontal<br />
attack from the south would be almost<br />
suicidal so long <strong>as</strong> the Germans held the<br />
higher ground on the north bank of the<br />
Amblève.<br />
Hobbs’s diagnosis of the problem <strong>as</strong><br />
“the physical proposition of human beings”<br />
may have been a truism but it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> sound. On the one side a tough<br />
force of cornered Germans weighted the<br />
scales, fighting in desperate f<strong>as</strong>hion and<br />
given physical and moral backing by<br />
heavily armored tanks mounting a superior<br />
gun and able to employ hull defilade,<br />
blocking a few well-defined and<br />
straightened avenues of approach. On<br />
16 The recital of the subsequent operations by<br />
the 82d Airborne Division comes from a variety<br />
of sources, mostly at regimental level, although<br />
some combat interviews cover battalions and com-<br />
panies: 325th Glider Inf AAR and Jnl; 517th Para<br />
Inf AAR; 504th AAR and S–3 Jnl, 505th S–2 and<br />
S–3 Per Rpts, 508th “The Belgian Campaign, Part<br />
I, 17–31 December”; 82d Abn Div, Commander’s<br />
Rpt, G–2 and G–3 Jnls. Published sources are<br />
mostly of the pictorial public relations type but<br />
some are of use, notably: W. G. Lord, Combat<br />
Record of the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment<br />
(Paris, 1948); <strong>History</strong> of the 508th Parachute In-<br />
fantry (W<strong>as</strong>hington, 1945); and Saga of the All<br />
American (Atlanta, 1946).<br />
the other side the counterweight con-<br />
sisted of a relatively few tanks whose<br />
crews knew that their tanks were not<br />
heavy enough for a headlong attack and<br />
their guns could not match the German<br />
tank guns in long-range dueling, and<br />
who were working with infantry whose<br />
strength w<strong>as</strong> no longer sufficient to pry<br />
the Panthers and Tigers out of their<br />
lairs. Nonetheless the “human being”<br />
could not be exactly equated at a dis-<br />
count rate against machines. Pfc. Jack<br />
Gebert demonstrated the point when he<br />
advanced through machine gun fire, de-<br />
stroyed a German tank with a bazooka<br />
round, climbed onto a U.S. tank, and<br />
directed its fire until shot down. He<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC posthumously.<br />
The answer seemed to be air attack.<br />
The missions set up to aid the 30th Divi-<br />
sion had been canceled on the morning<br />
of 20 December because of bad weather.<br />
The First <strong>Army</strong> air officers, however, had<br />
told Ridgway and Hobbs that t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
a fair chance of flying weather on the<br />
morning of the 22d. Hobbs <strong>as</strong>sured the<br />
corps commander that he “could use up<br />
to sixteen groups in one day,” that his<br />
own air support officer would have the<br />
targets ready. Here the matter rested-<br />
in the lap of the weather gods.<br />
Although t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little direct help<br />
that the 82d Airborne Division could<br />
give the 30th Division while the Ger-<br />
mans still held Stoumont, it had aided<br />
the attack north of the Ambleve on 21<br />
December by soldering the southern link<br />
in the bank around Kampfgruppe Peiper<br />
and by beating off the relief detachments<br />
of the 1st SS Panzer Division who were<br />
trying to lever an opening in this ring.<br />
The two companies of the 1st Bat-<br />
talion, 504th Parachute Infantry, that<br />
fought their way into Cheneux on the
THE GERMAN SALIENT EXPANDS TO THE WEST 367<br />
20th, had endangered Peiper’s only re-<br />
maining foothold on the south bank<br />
of the Amblève. Since the companies,<br />
B and C, had suffered very severe losses<br />
from the waist-high fire of the German<br />
.20-mm. self-propelled flak pieces while<br />
making the <strong>as</strong>sault across the open<br />
ground around the village, Colonel<br />
Tucker ordered in G Company and in<br />
the hours after midnight effected some<br />
reorganization. Fighting continued in-<br />
side the village all through the night,<br />
for the most part a hunt with knife and<br />
grenade to destroy the crews of the anti-<br />
aircraft half-tracks (the flak wagons)<br />
which had punished the paratroopers so<br />
badly. During the battle Pfc. Daniel<br />
Del Grippo, who had been painfully<br />
wounded, attacked and killed the crew<br />
of a self-propelled gun. S/Sgt. William<br />
Walsh, leading a platoon which became<br />
pinned down by flanking fire from a<br />
flak wagon, rushed the Germans and<br />
destroyed them with a grenade, although<br />
he w<strong>as</strong> so badly wounded that a comrade<br />
had to arm the grenade. Both of these<br />
soldiers received the DSC.<br />
When morning dawned General<br />
Gavin turned the entire regiment over<br />
to Tucker with orders to “wipe out”<br />
the Germans at Cheneux. The 3d Bat-<br />
talion (Lt. Col. Julian A. Cook) made<br />
a wide flanking movement in a six-hour<br />
march over rough ground and entered<br />
the village from the north side; by late<br />
afternoon the fight w<strong>as</strong> ended. The<br />
Americans had lost 225 dead and wound-<br />
ed, mostly from the two <strong>as</strong>sault com-<br />
panies. Company B had 18 men left and<br />
no officers; C Company had 38 men and<br />
3 officers. Few Germans were captured.<br />
The rear guard fought to the end, but<br />
most of the garrison still living had with-<br />
drawn during the night leaving scores of<br />
dead behind. Booty taken <strong>here</strong> included<br />
fourteen flak wagons and a battery of<br />
105-mm. howitzers, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> many ve-<br />
hicles. Only one German tank w<strong>as</strong> taken<br />
-a clue to the ability of the few survi-<br />
vors from the initial <strong>as</strong>sault to hang on<br />
in the village till help arrived.<br />
Peiper’s bridgehead w<strong>as</strong> gone. Lack-<br />
ing the g<strong>as</strong>oline to make an advance out<br />
of it on 19 December, and hoping that<br />
some resupply would be forthcoming, he<br />
had ordered it held <strong>as</strong> a possible future<br />
sally port, from which to resume the<br />
westward drive. But even <strong>as</strong> the bridge-<br />
head w<strong>as</strong> torn from the hands of his<br />
kampfgruppe, so the German relief<br />
forces were stopped before they could re-<br />
open the line of communications behind<br />
Peiper. In this feat also the 82d Air-<br />
borne had a share on 21 December by<br />
defending the Salm River line.
CHAPTER XVI<br />
One Threat Subsides; Another Emerges<br />
The Attempt <strong>To</strong> Relieve Peiper’s<br />
Kampfgruppe<br />
The quick and cheaply won victories<br />
which had taken Peiper’s armored<br />
kampfgruppe so close to the Meuse<br />
bridges in so short a time may have<br />
blinded the higher German staffs for<br />
a while to the fact that Peiper w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
danger. By the 21st, however, the most<br />
strenuous efforts were being made to<br />
save the ground he had won north of<br />
the Amblève and to rescue the men<br />
and materiel in his command. What<br />
happened to leave the kampfgruppe<br />
stranded and alone?<br />
The 1st SS Panzer Division had begun<br />
its drive west in four march groups mov-<br />
ing independently. The bulk of the 1st<br />
Panzer Regiment, a motorized battalion<br />
of armored infantry, a mobile company<br />
of engineers, and a battery of self-pro-<br />
pelled artillery (<strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> most of the<br />
g<strong>as</strong>oline available) had gone to Peiper<br />
with the expectation that the armored<br />
weight and the mobile character of this<br />
spearhead detachment would permit a<br />
quick breakthrough and exploitation<br />
even to the Meuse River. The balance<br />
of the division w<strong>as</strong> to follow hard on<br />
Peiper’s heels, provide reinforcement <strong>as</strong><br />
required, and keep the line of com-<br />
munications open until such time <strong>as</strong><br />
following divisions could take over and<br />
be prepared to re-form <strong>as</strong> a unit at the<br />
Meuse. By noon of 17 December Peiper’s<br />
kampfgruppe w<strong>as</strong> out of touch with the<br />
second and third march columns of the<br />
division and w<strong>as</strong> racing alone toward<br />
the west. The strongest of the rearward<br />
columns, the fourth, which amounted<br />
to a reinforced armored infantry regi-<br />
ment, had been held up by mines at the<br />
entrance to its designated route and in<br />
fact never made a start until 18 De-<br />
cember. The student of first causes may<br />
wish to speculate on the fateful role of<br />
the unknown cavalry, engineers, and<br />
foot soldiers who laid the mines between<br />
Lanzerath and Manderfeld, thus delay-<br />
ing most of the 1st SS Panzer Division<br />
armored infantry for a critical twenty-<br />
four hours.<br />
By 19 December, it will be recalled,<br />
Peiper w<strong>as</strong> over the Hohes Venn high-<br />
lands, had crossed to the north bank<br />
of the Ambléve River, and had secured<br />
the Stoumont-La Gleize area. At the<br />
same time he had almost completely<br />
drained his fuel tanks. On that same day<br />
radio communication of a sort had been<br />
re-established between Peiper and the<br />
1st SS Panzer Division headquarters,<br />
so that his plight w<strong>as</strong> known. The sec-<br />
ond march group, the mobile recon-<br />
naissance battalion, had come up and<br />
engaged the Americans at Stavelot, get-<br />
ting through some reinforcement to<br />
Peiper but failing in the larger t<strong>as</strong>k of<br />
keeping the door open behind Peiper.<br />
Meanwhile the third march group w<strong>as</strong><br />
moving slowly toward Stavelot while the
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES; ANOTHER EMERGES 369<br />
fourth, following the southern route<br />
through Recht, had become involved<br />
at roadblocks on the north flank of the<br />
7th Armored Division salient.<br />
The hardening American resistance<br />
ahead of Peiper and on his exposed north<br />
flank, plus reports that his fuel supply<br />
w<strong>as</strong> low, prompted the Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> commander and staff to undertake<br />
new plans and orders calculated to get<br />
the kampfgruppe rolling once again.<br />
The army chief of staff w<strong>as</strong> particularly<br />
concerned lest Peiper be forced to face<br />
north so <strong>as</strong> to protect his endangered<br />
flank and line of communications–<strong>as</strong> in<br />
fact happened. The nearest intact for-<br />
mation w<strong>as</strong> the 3d Parachute Division.<br />
But if this division were taken out<br />
of its blocking position south of Waimes<br />
the road would be open for American<br />
reinforcements from the north to reach<br />
St. Vith. The 12th SS Panzer Division,<br />
originally scheduled to be the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division’s running mate on the<br />
north, had been taken out of the fight<br />
at Krinkelt-Rocherath but w<strong>as</strong> engaged<br />
in refitting and a very roundabout move<br />
to get back onto the road west. T<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> no chance now that the 12th SS<br />
could reach the Malmedy sector <strong>as</strong><br />
planned and so cover Peiper’s flank.<br />
Peculiarly enough (and a commentary<br />
on the state of communications), both<br />
Peiper and the commander of the 3d<br />
Purachute Division thought that the<br />
12th SS Panzer Division actually w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
the vicinity of Malmédy, t<strong>here</strong> covering<br />
the north flank. The II SS Panzer Corps,<br />
whose two armored divisions were sup-<br />
posed to form a second wave behind the<br />
I SS Panzer Corps, w<strong>as</strong> still in the army<br />
rear and could not reach the Stoumont-<br />
La Gleize sector for three or four days,<br />
even if committed at once.<br />
The glaring fact w<strong>as</strong> that the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> had failed to crack a gap<br />
in the American front wide enough for<br />
the p<strong>as</strong>sage west of the two armored<br />
divisions supposedly leading the I SS<br />
Panzer Corps or for the quick forward<br />
movement of the infantry divisions that<br />
were earmarked for the northern block<br />
protecting the line of communications<br />
to the west. The best the Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> could do on the 19th and 20th<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to order supply troops and a small<br />
reconnaissance detachment of the 12th<br />
SS Panzer Division to guard the north<br />
flank between the 3d Parachute Division<br />
positions and Peiper, tell General Priess<br />
(the I SS Panzer Corps commander) to<br />
collect the 1st SS Panzer Division (-)<br />
for an attack to relieve Peiper, and ur-<br />
gently request the Luftwaffe to drop<br />
g<strong>as</strong>oline and ammunition for the isolated<br />
kampfgruppe. (One air resupply mis-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> flown on the night of 21 De-<br />
cember. But it w<strong>as</strong> difficult to hit the<br />
constricted zone in darkness, and the<br />
kampfgruppe got only enough g<strong>as</strong>oline<br />
to keep its radios going and to move<br />
a few of its tanks to more favorable<br />
firing positions. T<strong>here</strong>after the Luft-<br />
waffe refused all Sixth <strong>Army</strong> requests<br />
for such missions.)<br />
On the morning of 21 December SS-<br />
Oberfuehrer Mohnke, the 1st SS Pan-<br />
zer Division commander, had collected<br />
most of his third and fourth march<br />
groups in the area south of Stavelot and<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Trois Ponts. <strong>To</strong> reach Peiper it<br />
would be necessary to get onto the north<br />
bank of the Amblève and strike north-<br />
west or to cross the Salm and then turn<br />
north. What Mohnke’s intentions actu-<br />
ally were is hard to tell. Apparently he<br />
sent part of his infantry to ford the Am-<br />
blève between Trois Ponts and Stavelot
370 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
about the same time that T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Lovelady crossed to the north bank. The<br />
two forces probably missed each other<br />
in the morning fog, but it seems certain<br />
that the sizable German detachment en-<br />
countered by Colonel Lovelady when<br />
he attempted to push away from the<br />
north bank and up the ridge w<strong>as</strong> that<br />
sent by Mohnke. Meanwhile, when the<br />
Germans tried to cross heavy <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns on the temporary bridge above<br />
Trois Ponts the frail structure collapsed<br />
out of hand. Attempts to put in bridges<br />
at other points were all frustrated by<br />
artillery fire.<br />
Mohnke made his main effort with a<br />
westward thrust at the Salm River line,<br />
first in the direction of Trois Ponts,<br />
then <strong>as</strong> a groping attempt to find some<br />
weak spot farther south. His force<br />
would collide with the 505th Parachute<br />
Infantry, now spread along an 8,000-<br />
yard front reaching from Trois Ponts<br />
south to Grand Halleux. The initial Ger-<br />
man attack w<strong>as</strong> thrown against E Com-<br />
pany of the 505th Parachute Infantry,<br />
which had organized a small bridgehead<br />
on the cliff across the river e<strong>as</strong>t of Trois<br />
Ponts the day before. Fleeing civilians<br />
halted by patrols on the morning of the<br />
21st bore word of German tanks and<br />
infantry <strong>as</strong>sembling in Wanne. Shortly<br />
before noon a company led by self-pro-<br />
pelled guns appeared through the fog<br />
along a road running p<strong>as</strong>t the rise held<br />
by the paratroopers. An 8-man ba-<br />
zooka section knocked out the <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns, but its members were captured or<br />
killed. The howitzers of the 456th Para-<br />
chute Field Artillery Battalion west of<br />
the river went to work and for a time<br />
disorganized the enemy. Tanks were<br />
seen moving about and more German<br />
infantry were heard gathering. in the<br />
woods and draws.<br />
The commander of the 2d Battalion,<br />
505th Parachute Infantry (Lt. Col. Ben-<br />
jamin H. Vandervoort) tried unsuccess-<br />
fully to reach his regimental command-<br />
er by radio. In the absence of specific<br />
instructions <strong>as</strong> to the bridgehead, he<br />
then dispatched Company F to climb<br />
the cliff across the river. Company F<br />
moved into the woods on the right of<br />
Company E, while a jeep towed a single<br />
57-mm. antitank gun across stringers laid<br />
atop the broken bridge structure. This<br />
gun, manned by Lt. Jake Wurtich,<br />
fought an unequal duel with the panzers<br />
-its shells bouncing off the German<br />
armor–until it w<strong>as</strong> knocked out and<br />
Wurtich killed. The tanks, however,<br />
could not maneuver on the soggy, snow-<br />
covered ground and the fight broke into<br />
a series of hand-to-hand engagements<br />
swirling around little knots of infantry-<br />
men.<br />
The American rifle line w<strong>as</strong> steadily<br />
decre<strong>as</strong>ing in strength, denuded by<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties and carrying parties laborious-<br />
ly moving the wounded down and am-<br />
munition up the cliff. Vandervoort put<br />
one more platoon across the river. By<br />
this time the <strong>as</strong>sistant division com-<br />
mander and the regimental commander<br />
both had reached Trois Ponts and it w<strong>as</strong><br />
agreed that Ekman could withdraw his<br />
troops from the minuscule bridgehead.<br />
Having a third of his regiment commit-<br />
ted at this single point on his extend-<br />
ed and exposed front, Colonel Ekman<br />
decided to chance a daylight withdrawal.<br />
Some troops came back over the bridge<br />
but many, hard pressed, leaped off the<br />
cliff into the river. A number of the<br />
enemy, in close pursuit, crossed behind<br />
the Americans by fording or swinging<br />
along the broken bridges. Before the 2d
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES; ANOTHER EMERGES 371<br />
Battalion could reorganize on the west<br />
bank, at le<strong>as</strong>t two German platoons had<br />
crossed the river. They were immedi-<br />
ately knocked back, however.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the south of Trois Ponts the 3d<br />
Battalion of the 505th had been de-<br />
ployed on a wide front which w<strong>as</strong> ex-<br />
tended still more <strong>as</strong> its neighboring bat-<br />
talion concentrated at Trois Ponts. Near<br />
the three or four houses of the hamlet of<br />
La Neuville a bridge still spanned the<br />
Salm, covered by a platoon roadblock<br />
on the e<strong>as</strong>t bank. At dark a German<br />
column of tanks (or <strong>as</strong>sault guns) and<br />
infantry approached the bridge. The<br />
platoon called for artillery, engaged in<br />
a short exchange of fire, withdrew, and<br />
blew the bridge. Four large enemy fight-<br />
ing vehicles remained at the bridge site<br />
when the rest of the thwarted column<br />
turned away. They were too close for<br />
shellfire; so a four-man patrol armed<br />
with Gammon grenades crossed in the<br />
dark to deal with them, but <strong>as</strong> the patrol<br />
reached the e<strong>as</strong>t bank the tanks turned<br />
and lumbered off. During the evening<br />
enemy foot soldiers also tried to sneak<br />
across the wreckage of the railroad<br />
bridge south of Trois Ponts, an attack<br />
quickly ended when shellfire caught<br />
them right at the river.<br />
Although most of the night of 21 De-<br />
cember p<strong>as</strong>sed quietly it w<strong>as</strong> a time of<br />
strain because the 505th line at Trois<br />
Ponts w<strong>as</strong> thin, the enemy w<strong>as</strong> known<br />
to be strong, and the river w<strong>as</strong> fordable.<br />
The 82d Airborne Division <strong>as</strong> a whole<br />
w<strong>as</strong> too widely dispersed to permit im-<br />
mediate and large-scale help in the Trois<br />
Ponts sector. General Gavin, who had<br />
been in and out of the regimental com-<br />
mand post all day long, could give Colo-<br />
nel Ekman only one rifle company and<br />
a battery of groundmount .50-caliber<br />
machine guns for help on the morrow.<br />
When 22 December dawned the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps still w<strong>as</strong> engaged<br />
in maneuvering to create a solid barrier<br />
along its 45-mile front against the Ger-<br />
mans heading for the Meuse. Things<br />
were not going too well. The St. Vith<br />
salient had been dealt heavy blows and<br />
the lines t<strong>here</strong> were crumbling. The<br />
enemy had pushed <strong>as</strong> far along the<br />
Ourthe River valley <strong>as</strong> Hotton and<br />
w<strong>as</strong> gathering to the west of that river.<br />
General Hobbs, whose 30th Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
holding the corps north flank, felt that<br />
his sector now w<strong>as</strong> secure although he<br />
knew that enemy reinforcements had<br />
crossed the Ambléve. But he w<strong>as</strong> con-<br />
cerned lest the Germans bring off a<br />
successful eccentric attack north of Trois<br />
Ponts which would separate the 30th<br />
Division from the 82d Airborne. This<br />
he told General Ridgway in a telephone<br />
conversation on the morning of the 22d,<br />
but Ridgway gave him Gavin’s <strong>as</strong>surance<br />
that the paratroopers would hold, that<br />
nothing would get through to the west.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the corps commander the priority<br />
project in this sector remained that of<br />
eliminating the La Gleize-Stoumont<br />
pocket <strong>as</strong> rapidly and <strong>as</strong> thoroughly <strong>as</strong><br />
possible, freeing the 30th Division and<br />
its attached armor for urgent work else-<br />
w<strong>here</strong>.<br />
After a quiet night in most of the<br />
30th Division lines the day came with<br />
intense cold, falling snow, and heavy<br />
overc<strong>as</strong>t. Veteran troops by this time had<br />
learned that beautifully clear weather<br />
at the foxhole line often meant bad<br />
flying weather back at the air b<strong>as</strong>es:<br />
but they knew too that close tactical<br />
support necessitated a decent modicum<br />
of clear weather. At 0806 the 30th Divi-<br />
sion air officer learned that his targets
372 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
had been approved and that a fighter-<br />
bomber group would be on hand<br />
“weather permitting.” At almost the<br />
same moment General Hobbs got the<br />
word that he could expect no help from<br />
the air. The resumption of the attack to<br />
deflate the pocket would depend on<br />
ground troops and guns, most of all<br />
guns. The artillery, however, w<strong>as</strong> finding<br />
it difficult to get into good firing posi-<br />
tions, and the American troops were so<br />
near the target towns <strong>as</strong> to require the<br />
nicest type of precision ranging. Pros-<br />
pects for the attackers seemed <strong>as</strong> dis-<br />
couraging <strong>as</strong> the weather.<br />
The plan of 22 December included<br />
the continuation of the drive to take<br />
La Gleize and Stoumont plus an attack<br />
to mop up the 1st SS Panzer Division<br />
relief detachment which had dug in<br />
north of the Ambléve between Stavelot<br />
and Ster. This latter group w<strong>as</strong> estab-<br />
lished on the nose of a ridge, from which<br />
its fire swept north, west, and south, and<br />
in surrounding woods. Two rifle com-<br />
panies of the 3d Battalion, 117th In-<br />
fantry, working from the north, and the<br />
rifle company of the 120th Infantry<br />
attached to T<strong>as</strong>k Force Lovelady,<br />
attacking from the west, found every<br />
move checked by mortars, Werfers, and<br />
bullet fire. Finally a rifle company w<strong>as</strong><br />
sent from Stavelot to hit the Germans<br />
in the rear. T<strong>here</strong>after the Americans<br />
were able to converge on the ridge, but<br />
<strong>as</strong> day ended pockets of the enemy still<br />
remained in the woods. During the day<br />
other enemy troops had crossed the<br />
Ambléve and for a time isolated one of<br />
Lovelady’s roadblocks north of Trois<br />
Ponts. 1 But at no time on the 22d did<br />
1During the confused ebb and flow of battle on<br />
22 December, Sgt. John Bueno and Cpl. Adam F.<br />
Burko of the division engineer battalion (105th<br />
organized units of the relieving force<br />
of the 1st SS Panzer Division succeed in<br />
breaking through to Peiper in La Gleize.<br />
At the west end of the Peiper pocket<br />
the night of 21 December had witnessed<br />
the final reduction of the sanatorium,<br />
opening the way for a direct attack on<br />
Stoumont by T<strong>as</strong>k Force Harrison. Early<br />
that evening an officer of the 740th Tank<br />
Battalion had crawled into the enemy<br />
lines, scouting for a way to bring tanks<br />
around to the northwest of the build-<br />
ing. Returning to his own lines he called<br />
for volunteers to build a ramp over<br />
the fill, or embankment, which had<br />
barred direct <strong>as</strong>sault earlier in the<br />
fight. The ramp, constructed from shell<br />
c<strong>as</strong>tings, worked, and by midnight four<br />
Shermans were firing into the sanatori-<br />
um. Shortly t<strong>here</strong>after the Germans left<br />
the place. When the Americans entered<br />
the b<strong>as</strong>ement, they found that none of<br />
the civilian inhabitants had been killed<br />
or injured.<br />
General Harrison felt that it would<br />
be possible to bring in his attached<br />
armor and the 3d Battalion, 119th In-<br />
fantry, from the north, now that the<br />
enemy flanking position on the high<br />
ground w<strong>as</strong> gone. He set up this attack<br />
to precede the final <strong>as</strong>sault from the west.<br />
Patrols, groping their way through the<br />
morning snowstorm, found Stoumont<br />
strangely quiet, but Harrison w<strong>as</strong> well<br />
aware that the 119th had been seriously<br />
weakened and went ahead with plans<br />
for pounding the town with artillery<br />
Engineer Combat Battalion) took part in a fierce<br />
and successful attempt to recapture an American<br />
aid station and evacuate the wounded. After the<br />
platoon leader w<strong>as</strong> killed, these two men inspired<br />
their comrades, led in the fight, and were largely<br />
responsible for the rescue of the wounded. Both<br />
were awarded the DSC.
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES; ANOTHER EMERGES 373<br />
preparatory to the all-out infantry-armor<br />
push he had ordered for 1300. At noon<br />
the storm w<strong>as</strong> beginning to break and<br />
visibility promised to improve, a neces-<br />
sity if the artillery w<strong>as</strong> to give support<br />
by fire so close to the American lines.<br />
At 1320 the guns opened the fifteen-<br />
minute drum fire intended to pave the<br />
way for the northern <strong>as</strong>sault. Almost at<br />
once shells began to explode in the<br />
American <strong>as</strong>sembly are<strong>as</strong>, and t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> nothing to do but call off the bar-<br />
rage. The 3d Battalion and the tanks<br />
nevertheless started forward. By 1410<br />
they were at the edge of Stoumont, and<br />
the 1st Battalion had started in from the<br />
west.<br />
No German fire w<strong>as</strong> received-the oc-<br />
cupants of Stoumont were wounded Ger-<br />
mans and Americans left in the houses.<br />
Peiper had withdrawn his l<strong>as</strong>t forces in<br />
Stoumont during the night and early<br />
morning with the intention of fighting a<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t-ditch action at La Gleize w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
ground permitted an e<strong>as</strong>ier all-round<br />
defense. La Gleize, be it added, lay closer<br />
to the area w<strong>here</strong> the remainder of the<br />
1st SS Panzer Division had <strong>as</strong>sembled.<br />
But it seems likely, <strong>as</strong> Peiper himself<br />
later said, that Peiper’s decision to aban-<br />
don the western town had been prompt-<br />
ed to great degree by the threat, posed<br />
by the 2d Battalion, 119th Infantry, on<br />
21 December, to the line of communica-<br />
tions linking Stoumont and La Gleize.<br />
Despite General Hobbs’s insistence that<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Harrison push on promptly<br />
to La Gleize the advance w<strong>as</strong> halted just<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of the recaptured town. It w<strong>as</strong> now<br />
late in the day, and patrols had dis-<br />
covered German tanks operating <strong>as</strong> rear<br />
guard on the road to La Gleize.<br />
Elsew<strong>here</strong> on the northern edge of the<br />
Peiper pocket the status quo had ob-<br />
tained through most of the day. A little<br />
after noon T<strong>as</strong>k Force McGeorge,<br />
blocked on the valley road e<strong>as</strong>t of La<br />
Gleize, saw a column of German tanks<br />
and infantry move out to the north<br />
along the ridge road on the opposite side<br />
of the valley, the same route McGeorge’s<br />
column had been forced to abandon the<br />
day before. This reconnaissance, for it<br />
seems to have been no more, w<strong>as</strong> driven<br />
off by a few artillery concentrations.<br />
Later in the day T<strong>as</strong>k Force McGeorge<br />
made a p<strong>as</strong>s at the block barring the<br />
river road in the bend but lost its two<br />
lead tanks. Colonel Johnson of the 117th<br />
Infantry, commanding in this sector, ad-<br />
vised General Hobbs that tanks could<br />
not get p<strong>as</strong>t the bend and into La Gleize,<br />
that foot soldiers would have to do the<br />
job.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the south along the Salm River<br />
line the 1st SS Panzer Division made<br />
a number of attempts on 22 December<br />
to seize a bridge, build a bridge, or in<br />
some manner gain a crossing. The 505th<br />
Parachute Infantry had little trouble in<br />
wiping out the few small detachments<br />
that actually made it across, but with so<br />
much enemy activity apparent on the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t bank the 505th anticipated momen-<br />
tarily the launching of a full-scale <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault. Mohnke, it appears, w<strong>as</strong> trying<br />
to do too much with too little and so<br />
dissipated his limited strength that a<br />
forthright blow w<strong>as</strong> not struck at any<br />
one point during the 22d. The strongest<br />
effort came late in the evening when two<br />
of his companies tried to seize the bridge<br />
at Grand Halleux; this bridge w<strong>as</strong> blown<br />
when the leading Germans actually were<br />
on the span. On the whole the day had<br />
gone <strong>as</strong> badly for the 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division <strong>as</strong> for Peiper. It is true that<br />
few of the American riflemen had had
374 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
German infantry in their sights, but the<br />
artillery supporting the 30th Division<br />
and 505th by interdiction fire had taken<br />
heavy toll in the enemy <strong>as</strong>sembly are<strong>as</strong><br />
and on the roads, <strong>as</strong> later attested by<br />
the Germans themselves.<br />
Priess, the I SS Panzer Corps com-<br />
mander, had re<strong>as</strong>oned with the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> staff that Peiper should be<br />
given a chance to break out to the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
while his force still w<strong>as</strong> re<strong>as</strong>onably in-<br />
tact. The higher German commands,<br />
all the way up to OKW, remained con-<br />
vinced on 22 December that despite the<br />
growing strength of the Americans on<br />
the north flank the build-up t<strong>here</strong><br />
would not reach dangerous proportions<br />
before their own armored columns had<br />
reached and crossed the Meuse. Peiper,<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore, had to hold until such time<br />
<strong>as</strong> reinforcement and resupply could<br />
once again set his kampfgruppe on the<br />
way west.<br />
During the night of 22 December<br />
twenty Luftwaffe planes carrying g<strong>as</strong>o-<br />
line and ammunition flew to the trapped<br />
force. Probably the pilots had been<br />
briefed on the <strong>as</strong>sumption that Peiper<br />
still held Stoumont, for many of the<br />
g<strong>as</strong>oline containers parachuted into<br />
American hands t<strong>here</strong>. Peiper certainly<br />
w<strong>as</strong> helped little by this minor and mis-<br />
taken effort. On this occ<strong>as</strong>ion, <strong>as</strong> it<br />
turned out, the American air-warning<br />
net worked a bit too well. Both the 30th<br />
Division and the 82d Airborne were<br />
placed on alert against an airborne at-<br />
tack (although General Hobbs avowed<br />
that such an attack made little sense in<br />
this heavily forested and broken coun-<br />
try). The numerous antiaircraft artil-<br />
lery batteries backing up the divi-<br />
sions stood to their guns all night long,<br />
and the infantry were given little sleep<br />
<strong>as</strong> rumors ran wild of parachutists<br />
sighted hither and yon.<br />
Interrogation of prisoners and artil-<br />
lery observer reports had indicated that<br />
the Germans were moving troops into<br />
the sector south of Malmédy reviving<br />
the earlier American concern that a<br />
hard blow might be dealt t<strong>here</strong> at the<br />
30th Division. As a result General Hobbs<br />
w<strong>as</strong> able to hold onto all the reinforce-<br />
ments which had accumulated to the<br />
30th, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> CCB, 3d Armored Divi-<br />
sion. The Malmédy threat seems to have<br />
been raised by a few troops of the 3d<br />
Parachute Division, who had moved west<br />
of Waimes, and by rumors rife in the<br />
German camp that the 12th SS Panzer<br />
Division (held up by the Sixth <strong>Army</strong><br />
attempt to seize the Elsenborn ridge)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> moving in to support the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division. Actually the 23d p<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
quietly in the Malmédy-Stavelot sector.<br />
Opposite the 505th Parachute Infantry<br />
the enemy contented himself with spo-<br />
radic firing across the river. Mohnke, it<br />
would appear, lacked the strength<br />
needed for resumption of the attack to<br />
free Peiper. At le<strong>as</strong>t his corps com-<br />
mander, Priess, <strong>as</strong>ked the II SS Panzer<br />
Corps to deflect the 9th SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sion, coming forward on the left, and<br />
throw it in at Stavelot. This request w<strong>as</strong><br />
denied.<br />
Major action on 23 December did<br />
flare up at La Gleize and along the north<br />
bank of the Amblève, w<strong>here</strong> a part of<br />
the 1st SS Panzer Division relief force<br />
still maintained a foothold. In the latter<br />
sector six American rifle companies were<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembled to clear out the woods and<br />
restore the cut made by the enemy on<br />
the road between Trois Ponts and Stave-<br />
lot. Regrouping in the heavy woods took<br />
nearly all day and w<strong>as</strong> marked by some
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES; ANOTHER EMERGES 375<br />
sharp cl<strong>as</strong>hes. At Petit Coo, close by<br />
Stavelot, S/Sgt. Paul Bolden and T/Sgt.<br />
Russell N. Snoad decided to attack a<br />
house from which the Germans were<br />
firing. While his companion fired to<br />
cover him, Bolden rushed the door,<br />
tossed in a pair of hand grenades, then<br />
went in firing his <strong>To</strong>mmy gun. Bolden<br />
killed twenty of the enemy, then with-<br />
drew. A bl<strong>as</strong>t of fire killed Bolden’s com-<br />
rade and wounded the sergeant, but he<br />
d<strong>as</strong>hed back into the house, killing fif-<br />
teen more of the enemy. (Bolden later<br />
received the Medal of Honor and Snoad<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC posthumously.)<br />
As for La Gleize the story once again<br />
w<strong>as</strong> one of frustration and failure. Most<br />
of Peiper’s troops were driven to the<br />
cellars of the town by the incessant shell-<br />
fire, incre<strong>as</strong>ing in the afternoon <strong>as</strong> the<br />
American attack brought forward ob-<br />
servers closer to the target, and made<br />
even more effective by the new POZIT<br />
fuze which the 113th Field Artillery<br />
w<strong>as</strong> using. But w<strong>here</strong>ver and whenever<br />
the attacking tanks and infantry tried<br />
to move along the roads and trails wind-<br />
ing up the ridge nose to La Gleize,<br />
they encountered mine plots swept by<br />
direct fire from deeply dug in tanks and<br />
antitank guns. Progress then w<strong>as</strong> slow;<br />
the leading American tank would be<br />
knocked out or burned by a direct hit<br />
with armor-piercing ammunition, even-<br />
tually the infantry would work around<br />
and destroy or neutralize the German<br />
105-MM. HOWITZERS M7 OF THE 30TH DIVISION IN ACTION near La Gleize.
376 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
weapon, the engineers would remove<br />
the mine field, and the advance would<br />
continue.<br />
Harrison decided that a flanking move<br />
through the woods to the north might<br />
work and in the afternoon elements of<br />
the American rifle companies reached<br />
the edge of La Gleize, only to come<br />
under machine gun and 20-mm. fire<br />
from streets and houses. General Har-<br />
rison's main worry w<strong>as</strong> the heavy<br />
German tanks gat<strong>here</strong>d in the center of<br />
the town. Would they break out in a<br />
desperate counterattack against the<br />
lighter and more vulnerable Shermans?<br />
Would they slip through the net and<br />
bludgeon their way to the Amblève? <strong>To</strong><br />
deal with the tanks, Allied planes<br />
were promised for a strike at the town<br />
square. They came <strong>as</strong> promised but hit<br />
Malmédy instead of La Gleize, their<br />
bombs burying a number of civilians<br />
in one of the hotel buildings before the<br />
strike could be called off.<br />
Peiper had yet to be driven out of<br />
La Gleize; the 1st SS Panzer Division<br />
bridgehead force north of the Ambléve<br />
(which had cut off a part of T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Lovelady) still had to be liquidated.<br />
But this fight in the bend of the Ambléve<br />
had become anticlimactic, dwarfed by<br />
far more important operations elsew<strong>here</strong><br />
on the northern shoulder of the Arden-<br />
nes salient. Through the early evening of<br />
the 23d the telephone wires connecting<br />
the headquarters of the First <strong>Army</strong>, the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps, and the 30th<br />
Division were busy: the First <strong>Army</strong> in-<br />
sisting that Hobbs must rele<strong>as</strong>e CCB,<br />
3d Armored, for immediate return to<br />
its hard-pressed division; the 30th Divi-<br />
sion commander protesting that the loss<br />
of the combat command would leave<br />
La Gleize open on two sides and make<br />
it impossible to mop up the bridgehead<br />
force; General Ridgway for his part.<br />
essaying on the scene the role of the<br />
honest broker. The final decision w<strong>as</strong><br />
favorable to Hobbs: General Boudinot,<br />
the CCB commander, would start his<br />
trains moving but at le<strong>as</strong>t two-thirds of<br />
the command would be left for the final<br />
tough fight envisaged for the coming<br />
morning.<br />
The net had been drawn tight around<br />
Peiper, <strong>as</strong> tight <strong>as</strong> it could be drawn in<br />
this complex of woods and hills. But<br />
on the morning of the 24th most of<br />
the quarry had flown. Late the previous<br />
afternoon Mohnke had radioed Peiper<br />
permission to break out. Peiper knew<br />
that he could not take his vehicles or<br />
his wounded, that the escape would<br />
have to be made at night and on foot.<br />
Leaving a rear guard to demolish the<br />
tanks, trucks, and guns, Peiper and some<br />
eight hundred of his command started<br />
at 0100 in single file through the woods<br />
fringing La Gleize on the south, crossed<br />
the river, and <strong>as</strong> day broke took cover<br />
among the densely wooded hills north of<br />
Trois Ponts. On the night of the 24th<br />
Peiper's force crossed the Salm, briefly<br />
engaging troops of the 82d Airborne<br />
Division in a brisk exchange of fire,<br />
and on Christm<strong>as</strong> morning rejoined the<br />
1st SS Panzer Division south of Stavelot.<br />
The 30th Division commander, under<br />
pressure from corps and army to finish<br />
the job at La Gleize and rele<strong>as</strong>e Boudi-<br />
not's armor, had made no promises that<br />
La Gleize would fall on the 24th but<br />
had urged his unit commanders to get<br />
the attack rolling early and finish off<br />
the defenders. <strong>To</strong> tired troops who had<br />
expected a desperate l<strong>as</strong>t stand it must<br />
have been gratifying to find the town<br />
open for the taking. They liberated
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES: ANOTHER EMERGES<br />
about 170 Americans, most of whom had<br />
been captured at Stoumont on 19 De-<br />
cember. The prisoners they took, nearly<br />
all wounded, numbered 300. Twenty-<br />
eight tanks, 70 half-tracks, and 25 artil-<br />
lery pieces were found in the town. This<br />
booty, plus the German tanks and guns<br />
destroyed earlier in the operation, ac-<br />
counted for nearly the entire heavy<br />
equipment of the 1st SS Panzer Regi-<br />
ment. Although those of Peiper’s troops<br />
who had escaped were back in the line<br />
with the reconstituted 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division, that elite unit could no longer<br />
be considered an armored division.<br />
In an epilogue to the taking of La<br />
Gleize, foot troops of the 117th and<br />
120th Infantry Regiments began the<br />
slow work of beating the woods in the<br />
triangle formed by the Salm and the<br />
Amblève w<strong>here</strong> a part of the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division relief force continued<br />
to hold out. In the woods north of La<br />
Gleize some fifty Germans who apparent-<br />
ly had not received the orders to with-<br />
draw tried to fight it out. All were killed.<br />
What German strength had seeped into<br />
this appendix at the rivers no one knew.<br />
Rumors of twenty-five enemy tanks hid-<br />
ing in the road cuts north of Trois Ponts<br />
had the result of delaying the relief of<br />
CCB of the 3d Armored Division. That<br />
some armored vehicles had crossed to<br />
the north bank of the Amblève by im-<br />
provised bridging seems certain, but<br />
most succeeded in escaping to the south,<br />
By the 26th the l<strong>as</strong>t Germans had been<br />
captured, killed, or driven off from the<br />
north bank of the Amblève. The satis-<br />
faction which the 30th Division could<br />
take in giving the quietus to Kumpf-<br />
gruppe Peiper w<strong>as</strong> alloyed by untoward<br />
events at Malmédy on the 24th and 25th.<br />
On these days American planes bombed<br />
377<br />
the 120th Infantry (at le<strong>as</strong>t thirty-seven<br />
Americans lost their lives on the first<br />
day), killed a considerable number of<br />
civilians, and set the town afire. A m<strong>as</strong>s<br />
flight started by the population w<strong>as</strong><br />
halted only with great difficulty. 2<br />
The 3d Armored Division Is<br />
Checked, 21–23 December<br />
Still minus two of its combat com-<br />
mands the 3d Armored Division w<strong>as</strong> pre-<br />
pared, on the morning of 21 December,<br />
to retake Samrée, the communications<br />
and supply center on the middle route<br />
of the 3d Armored (-) advance which<br />
had been seized by the enemy the pre-<br />
vious afternoon. (Map VII) With this<br />
intent General Rose sent a part of his<br />
very small reserve to reinforce the center<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force (now T<strong>as</strong>k Force Orr) north<br />
of the village of Dochamps. During the<br />
previous night Rose had <strong>as</strong>ked General<br />
Ridgeway for respite from his main mis-<br />
sion, that is, the advance to the Liège-<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne highway and an attempt to<br />
re-establish contact with the VIII Corps,<br />
until the situation at Samrée could be<br />
cleared up. At 0815, however, Rose <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sured Ridgway that the 3d Armored w<strong>as</strong><br />
moving once again to accomplish its<br />
major mission. Less than a half-hour later<br />
German tanks were discovered moving<br />
toward Hotton, w<strong>here</strong> the rear command<br />
2 The unfortunate and costly bombing raids on<br />
Malmédy were the result of tragic errors. This w<strong>as</strong><br />
acknowledged by the IX Bombardment Division,<br />
but the Ninth Air Force and General Carl Spaatz<br />
at first refused to do so and referred to the “al-<br />
leged” errors at Malmédy, a view corrected in<br />
Craven and Cate (eds.) , Europe: ARGUMENT to<br />
V–E Day, p. 670. Royce L. Thompson h<strong>as</strong> a quite<br />
complete study of these air strikes in his unpub-<br />
lished manuscript entitled Malmédy, Belgium, Mis-<br />
taken Bombing, 23 and 25 December 1944 (1952),<br />
in OCMH files. Thompson’s work is b<strong>as</strong>ed on<br />
official Air Force records.
378 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
post and installations of the 3d Armored<br />
Division were located. The immediate<br />
result of this threat w<strong>as</strong> to nullify the<br />
reinforcement readied for dispatch from<br />
Soy, w<strong>here</strong> the combat reserve held by<br />
Colonel Howze w<strong>as</strong> located, to the<br />
Samrée sector.<br />
General Krueger, the LVIII Panzer<br />
Corps commander, had re<strong>as</strong>on to con-<br />
gratulate himself at the close of the<br />
40th for the decision to back away from<br />
the Ourthe River line northwest of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne. In turning north his corps had<br />
crossed the e<strong>as</strong>t-west segment of that<br />
river without trouble, had discovered<br />
large stocks of g<strong>as</strong>oline at Samrée,<br />
and had met so little opposition <strong>as</strong> to<br />
indicate a general retrograde move on<br />
the part of the Americans. Krueger de-<br />
termined to strike while the iron w<strong>as</strong><br />
hot, drive northwest at top speed to<br />
the bridgehead town of Hotton, recross<br />
the Ourthe River at that point, and con-<br />
centrate his corps on the far bank be-<br />
fore the Americans could establish a<br />
blocking line. Thus far Krueger’s ad-<br />
vance guard had fought only outpost or<br />
patrol actions with the 3d Armored<br />
Division and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little re<strong>as</strong>on, <strong>as</strong><br />
Krueger saw it, to anticipate much re-<br />
sistance during the next twenty-four<br />
hours. He did know, from radio mes-<br />
sages intercepted by OB WEST, that<br />
one combat command of the 3d Armored<br />
Division had moved into the Wer-<br />
bomont area on 19 December.<br />
After the seizure of Samrée, Krueger<br />
dispatched an armored t<strong>as</strong>k force<br />
(Kampfgruppe Buyer) from the 116th<br />
Panzer Division to gain control of the<br />
road between Soy and Hotton prelimi-<br />
nary to seizure of the latter bridgehead<br />
town. During the night of 20 Decem-<br />
ber this t<strong>as</strong>k force marched northwest<br />
along a secondary route parallel to<br />
and between the roads on which T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Hogan and T<strong>as</strong>k Force Orr had<br />
made their advance during the day.<br />
Just at daybreak members of an Amer-<br />
ican patrol operating out of the Com-<br />
bat Command Reserve headquarters<br />
at So): were fired upon. They reported<br />
that they “thought” they had heard<br />
German voices. This w<strong>as</strong> the first<br />
evidence that the enemy had pene-<br />
trated to the 3d Armored rear. The<br />
next message from Soy to reach the<br />
division command post at Erezée came<br />
at 0850: “many enemy tanks” had de-<br />
bouched <strong>as</strong>tride the Soy-Hotton road<br />
and were heading west toward Hotton.<br />
Actually the attack at Hotton had al-<br />
ready begun.<br />
The town of Hotton (about ten miles<br />
northwest of La Roche), is built <strong>as</strong>tride<br />
the main channel of the Ourthe at<br />
a point w<strong>here</strong> the valley widens. Here<br />
a series of roads converge to cross the<br />
river and proceed on the west bank<br />
to the more important junction center<br />
at Marche from which roads radiate<br />
in all directions. In the center of Hot-<br />
ton the river w<strong>as</strong> spanned at this time<br />
by a cl<strong>as</strong>s 70 two-way wooden bridge.<br />
In the buildings e<strong>as</strong>t of the river were<br />
installed about two hundred men from<br />
the service detachments of the division<br />
and CCR headquarters. T<strong>here</strong> were, in<br />
addition, one light and one medium<br />
tank. On the west bank at the bridge<br />
exit a platoon of the 51st Engineer<br />
Battalion (Capt. Preston C. Hodges)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> deployed, reinforced by two 40-mm.<br />
antitank guns, a 37-mm. antitank gun,<br />
and a Sherman tank. A squad of engi-<br />
neers guarded a footbridge at Hamp-<br />
teau, two thousand yards south of the<br />
town.
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES: ANOTHER EMERGES 379<br />
At dawn mortar and small arms fire<br />
suddenly gave notice of the enemy. De-<br />
spite c<strong>as</strong>ualties and confusion a defense<br />
w<strong>as</strong> h<strong>as</strong>tily set up by the executive<br />
officer of the 23d Armored Engineer<br />
Battalion (Maj. Jack W. Fickessen) , en-<br />
gineer trucks were driven out to block<br />
the roads, and bazook<strong>as</strong> and machine<br />
guns were distributed for a close-in de-<br />
fense of the town. Taking advantage of<br />
the woods that came right up to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern edge of Hotton, four or five en-<br />
emy tanks rumbled forward to lead the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault. The two American tanks e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
the river were knocked out at once; but<br />
on the opposite bank a 90-mm. tank<br />
destroyer “appeared from now<strong>here</strong>,” got<br />
a direct hit on a Panther and perhaps<br />
a second German <strong>as</strong> well. The enemy<br />
infantry were able to take about half<br />
the buildings on the near bank but were<br />
checked short of the bridge by the rifles,<br />
bazook<strong>as</strong>, and machine guns in the<br />
hands of men on both banks of the riv-<br />
er. (A “hailstorm of fire,” say the Ger-<br />
mans.) The engineer squad guarding<br />
the footbridge south of Hotton w<strong>as</strong> over-<br />
run, apparently by Germans wearing<br />
American uniforms, but fortunately this<br />
bridge could bear no vehicles.<br />
By the middle of the morning the de-<br />
fenders, now recovered from their in-<br />
itial surprise, were holding their own<br />
and the vehicles in the town were evac-<br />
uated to the north along with most of<br />
the medical personnel and ambulances.<br />
Two or three more German tanks were<br />
destroyed by bazook<strong>as</strong> (one w<strong>as</strong> even<br />
chalked up to the account of the 37-<br />
mm. antitank gun). For some re<strong>as</strong>on<br />
the enemy had not thrown all of his<br />
tanks into the battle at once, a fortu-<br />
nate circumstance. By 1400 the tanks<br />
still in town joined those on the hill<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Hotton against the counterat-<br />
tack which Colonel Howze had launched<br />
along the Soy road. About this time<br />
Howze w<strong>as</strong> able to get a small group<br />
of tanks and infantry around to the<br />
north of the attackers and into Hotton,<br />
redressing the balance somewhat. As yet<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> impossible to bring any friendly<br />
artillery to bear, and the foot troops<br />
continued to rely largely on their own<br />
weapons for the rest of the day.<br />
General Rose, <strong>as</strong> already indicated,<br />
had at his immediate disposal a very<br />
limited reserve. Although he had or-<br />
dered Howze to counterattack with the<br />
entire force of the Combat Command<br />
Reserve it became apparent <strong>as</strong> day<br />
wore on that this would be insufficient.<br />
The ground over which the counterat-<br />
tack from Soy had to move gave every<br />
advantage to the Germans. Maneuver<br />
w<strong>as</strong> restricted by the cuts through<br />
which ran the Hotton road, by a stream<br />
bordering the road on the south, and<br />
by the German position atop the nose<br />
of the hill between the two towns which<br />
gave observation and fire over the bar-<br />
ren ground to the north. Since Gener-<br />
al Rose had been promised the use of<br />
a battalion from the 5 17th Parachute<br />
Infantry, he decided to hold up the drive<br />
from Soy until it arrived. Also it ap-<br />
peared that the defenders of Hotton<br />
would shortly be reinforced by part of<br />
the leading RCT of the 84th Infantry<br />
Division, moving via Marche under<br />
orders from Ridgway to secure the<br />
Ourthe River line south of Hotton.<br />
This help w<strong>as</strong> slow in coming. As<br />
early <strong>as</strong> 0900 the 51st Engineer Battal-<br />
ion commander had <strong>as</strong>ked the 84th to<br />
send aid to Hotton but the staff of the<br />
latter seem to have taken rather skeptical-<br />
ly reports of the enemy strength in-
380 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
volved. Two platoons finally arrived in<br />
Hotton late in the afternoon but by this<br />
time the German infantry were leaving<br />
the town and loading into their half-<br />
tracks <strong>as</strong> if the fight were over. Through<br />
the night American mortars in Hotton<br />
laid down a defensive barrage of illumi-<br />
nating shell and high explosives, but the<br />
enemy made no move to return to the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault.<br />
The commander of the 116th Panzer<br />
Division, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> General Manteuf-<br />
fel, would later pay tribute to “the brav-<br />
ery of the American engineers” at<br />
Hotton. They had re<strong>as</strong>on for this ac-<br />
knowledgment (in which they could<br />
have included signal and service troops,<br />
unknown gun and tank crews) because<br />
the failure to secure the Hotton bridge<br />
w<strong>as</strong> decisive in the future history of the<br />
LVIII Panzer Corps. Credit must al-<br />
so go to the Combat Command Reserve<br />
at Soy whose fire, <strong>as</strong> the enemy acknowl-<br />
edged, caught Kampfgruppe Buyer in<br />
the flank and checkmated its single-<br />
minded employment against Hotton.<br />
Finally, a share in the successful defense<br />
of the Hotton bridge should be <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
those elements of the three 3d Armored<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k forces which, on the 21st, had en-<br />
gaged the bulk of the 116th Panzer Divi-<br />
sion and 560th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion and prevented a wholesale advance<br />
into the Hotton sector.<br />
Krueger’s original intention had been<br />
to risk a. thrust for the Hotton bridge<br />
without regard to flank security. The<br />
armored t<strong>as</strong>k force moving on Hotton<br />
accordingly contained most of the for-<br />
ward combat elements of the 116th Pan-<br />
zer Regiment and 60th Panzer Grena-<br />
dier Regiment. But the presence of<br />
American armor and infantry in the<br />
area between Soy and Dochamps, <strong>as</strong> this<br />
became apparent during the morning<br />
of 21 December, forced Krueger to face<br />
much of the strength of the two regi-<br />
ments to the e<strong>as</strong>t and northe<strong>as</strong>t so <strong>as</strong><br />
to form a protected corridor for the<br />
drive into Hotton.<br />
Through this corridor the 156th Pan-<br />
zer Grenadier Regiment, which had<br />
been in reserve south of Samrée, moved<br />
late in the afternoon to an <strong>as</strong>sembly area<br />
around Beffe. At the b<strong>as</strong>e of the corri-<br />
dor, that is, around Dochamps, the<br />
1128th Regiment of the 560th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division made an attack to<br />
widen the path northwest to the Ourthe<br />
crossing. Early in the day the grenadiers<br />
collided with T<strong>as</strong>k Force Orr while the<br />
latter w<strong>as</strong> trying to eradicate the road-<br />
block which barred the road up to<br />
Dochamps and Samrée. In a sharp action<br />
at a hairpin turn in the road at the b<strong>as</strong>e<br />
of the Dochamps hill the German in-<br />
fantry infiltrated close enough to ba-<br />
zooka three tanks but themselves took a<br />
beating from the American artillery.<br />
Twice during the day Orr had to order<br />
a withdrawal, the l<strong>as</strong>t bringing the t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force to Amonines, three miles south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Soy. Here on a slight rise over-<br />
looking the Aisne valley road Orr’s<br />
column formed a perimeter defense for<br />
the night.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hogan, checked the pre-<br />
vious day in the winding Ourthe val-<br />
ley southe<strong>as</strong>t of La Roche, came under<br />
attack early on the 21st by small enemy<br />
groups striking out from the roadblock.<br />
The LVIII Panzer Corps commander<br />
had no intention of taking La Roche<br />
unless it could be occupied without a<br />
fight and had committed only a frac-<br />
tion of the 60th Panzer Grenadier Regi-<br />
ment to throw out a screen <strong>here</strong>. Later<br />
in the day part of the Reconnaissance
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES: ANOTHER EMERGES 381<br />
Battalion, 116th Panzer Division, arrived<br />
from Houffalize and started running<br />
combat patrols through the woods in<br />
front of La Roche. Hogan, under orders<br />
to hold up his own advance until Orr<br />
could take Samrée, finally received a<br />
change in orders about 1300 which<br />
directed his t<strong>as</strong>k force to fall back on<br />
Amonines. It w<strong>as</strong> crystal clear by this<br />
hour that t<strong>here</strong> could be no advance to<br />
Samrée. Hogan’s column moved north,<br />
skirmishing with small German forces<br />
along the way, but at twilight ran into<br />
machine gun fire and lost its lead tank<br />
to a German bazooka just at the edge of<br />
the hamlet of Beffe. Without realizing<br />
the fact, the Americans had hit the <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembly area of the 156th Panzer Grena-<br />
dier Regiment. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> nothing for<br />
it at this time of day but to pull away.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hogan retired to the south<br />
and bivouacked on a hill near Marcou-<br />
ray. Although their plight w<strong>as</strong> not im-<br />
mediately apparent, Hogan and his 400<br />
men had been cut off from the rest of<br />
the 3d Armored Division.<br />
The e<strong>as</strong>tern column, T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Kane, alone of the 3d Armored forces<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed the morning of the 21st without<br />
enemy contact. As planned, Kane sent<br />
a detachment south to the important<br />
crossroads at Baraque de Fraiture, on<br />
the Vielsalm-Samrée route, to reinforce<br />
the mixed group of Americans already<br />
t<strong>here</strong> and to take part in the final attack<br />
on Samrée. This detachment reached the<br />
crossroads in the middle of the afternoon<br />
and t<strong>here</strong> met the 7th Armored Division<br />
cavalry which had come in from Viel-<br />
salm the previous evening. Caught up<br />
in the fight already started at the cross-<br />
roads, the tanks and armored cars were<br />
unable to proceed to Samrée. The re-<br />
maining troops of T<strong>as</strong>k Force Kane re-<br />
ceived orders during the afternoon to<br />
move on Dochamps <strong>as</strong> part of a pro-<br />
jected concentric maneuver to retake<br />
Samrée and did advance about a mile<br />
south of Grandménil before darkness<br />
closed in.<br />
The 3d Armored Division had met a<br />
superior force on the 21st, had failed<br />
to retake Samrée, had been forced to<br />
use its reserves in a fight to reopen the<br />
road to Hotton, and had seen its west-<br />
ern and center t<strong>as</strong>k forces pushed back.<br />
But t<strong>here</strong> were some re<strong>as</strong>ons to expect<br />
an improvement in what had been a<br />
deteriorating situation. The Hotton<br />
bridge had been held and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
word that the 84th Infantry Division<br />
would lend a hand. The 3d Armored<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> going to get back its own<br />
CCA, although under a corps prohibi-<br />
tion against using it save in dire cir-<br />
cumstances, and during the. night of 21<br />
December CCA did close north of Man-<br />
hay. At le<strong>as</strong>t a battalion of the 517th<br />
Parachute Infantry w<strong>as</strong> on its way to<br />
reinforce the Combat Command Re-<br />
serve at Soy. The e<strong>as</strong>tern flank had<br />
been more or less secured by contact<br />
made between T<strong>as</strong>k Force Kane and the<br />
82d Airborne Division during the day.<br />
All this w<strong>as</strong> heartening, but t<strong>here</strong> re-<br />
mained the worry <strong>as</strong> to what the full<br />
enemy strength and intentions might be.<br />
Operations maps posted on the night<br />
of the 21st in the bunkers housing the<br />
Wehrmachtfuehrungsstab showed the<br />
LVIII Panzer Corps <strong>as</strong> the most ad-<br />
vanced unit of all the German forces<br />
driving west, with its 116th Panzer Divi-<br />
sion at Hotton, only twenty air-line miles<br />
from the Meuse River. But the fight at<br />
Hotton, despite what the operations<br />
map might show, had convinced the<br />
L VIII Panzer Corps commander that,
382 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
instead of finding a quick and e<strong>as</strong>y way<br />
to cross the Ourthe by his shift to the<br />
northwest, he stood an excellent chance<br />
of running his corps into a cul-de-sac.<br />
Unwilling to continue down what might<br />
turn into a blind alley, if the Americans<br />
continued to defend Hotton <strong>as</strong> stanchly<br />
<strong>as</strong> they had during the day, General<br />
Krueger revised his plans. His southern<br />
neighbor, Lauchert’s 2d Panzer Divi-<br />
sion, w<strong>as</strong> reported to have seized a<br />
bridge across the western arm of<br />
the Ourthe and might be expected to<br />
move so rapidly into the Marche sector,<br />
on the west side of the main channel,<br />
that the American barrier line which<br />
Krueger had feared at the Ourthe could<br />
not be placed in operation. Krueger,<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore, ordered the 116th Panzer<br />
Division to disengage on the Soy-Hotton<br />
road, pull back <strong>as</strong> rapidly <strong>as</strong> possible to<br />
the south, and cross the Ourthe at La<br />
Roche. This town had been abandoned<br />
by the Americans during the afternoon<br />
when the 7th Armored Division trains,<br />
threatened with encirclement, crossed<br />
the river and moved to Marche, leaving<br />
only some pickets to guard the road-<br />
blocks at the various bridges.<br />
Krueger intended to use the 560th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division to continue<br />
the attack northwest, aiming for the<br />
Ourthe crossings at Han north of Hot-<br />
ton. At twilight the leading elements of<br />
the 2d SS Panzer Division were in posi-<br />
tion on the right flank of the 560th.<br />
This fresh division, when <strong>as</strong>sembled, w<strong>as</strong><br />
to p<strong>as</strong>s to the LVIII Panzer Corps and<br />
could be used to cover the exposed e<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
ern flank-a source of continuous con-<br />
cern to the corps commander. General<br />
Krueger, an experienced and intelligent<br />
officer, may not have been <strong>as</strong> hopeful of<br />
success <strong>as</strong> his plans for 22 December<br />
would indicate. He records that his com-<br />
mand had suffered very heavy c<strong>as</strong>ualties<br />
during the fighting of the 21st, that troop<br />
morale w<strong>as</strong> flagging, that fatigue w<strong>as</strong> be-<br />
ginning to tell, and that, for the first<br />
time, the advance had begun to decel-<br />
erate.<br />
While Krueger laid plans for shift-<br />
ing the LVIII Panzer Corps armor to<br />
the west bank of the Ourthe, his oppo-<br />
nent, General Ridgway, w<strong>as</strong> issuing or-<br />
ders designed to strengthen and extend<br />
the XVIII Airborne Corps right wing<br />
west of the Ourthe. At dawn of the 22d,<br />
CCA of the 3d Armored Division had<br />
just completed its move to rejoin Gen-<br />
eral Rose when the corps commander<br />
ordered Rose to throw out a screen on<br />
the west bank between La Roche and<br />
St. Hubert <strong>as</strong> cover for the American<br />
concentration in process around Marche.<br />
By noon a t<strong>as</strong>k force from CCA<br />
w<strong>as</strong> en route to carry out this mission.<br />
<strong>Of</strong> the reinforcement that General Rose<br />
had counted on only one tank battalion<br />
and one company of armored infantry<br />
were left. The 3d Armored Division<br />
would have to continue the battle to<br />
establish a holding position with forces<br />
hardly stronger than those which had<br />
been driven back on the 21st. The<br />
final orders for the day were “counter-<br />
attack”: first, to drive the enemy out<br />
of the Soy-Hotton sector, second, to re-<br />
take the hill m<strong>as</strong>s at Dochamps-Sam-<br />
rée in the center of the division zone.<br />
The job of dealing with German pene-<br />
tration between the Ourthe and the<br />
Aisne Rivers fell to CCR (and T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Hogan). For this Colonel Howze<br />
would get the battalion from the 517th<br />
Parachute Infantry <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> it arrived.<br />
Those troops of CCA still in the<br />
division commander’s hand (T<strong>as</strong>k Force
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES; ANOTHER EMERGES 383<br />
Richardson) would serve <strong>as</strong> backstop be-<br />
hind the two remaining t<strong>as</strong>k forces, Orr<br />
and Kane, which were charged with the<br />
capture of Dochamps.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Orr w<strong>as</strong> at the vortex<br />
of the action on the 22d, standing <strong>as</strong><br />
it did in the path of the main move-<br />
ment by the 560th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division. The 116th Panzer Division, on<br />
the German left, would have to dis-<br />
engage its forward units during the<br />
coming night, and in order to effect<br />
the relief the 560th had to be brought<br />
forward. This German advance, be-<br />
gun by two regiments abre<strong>as</strong>t, started<br />
at daylight, its object the command of<br />
the Erezée-Soy-Hotton road. Meanwhile<br />
Colonel Orr led his counterattack force<br />
out of Amonines, heading down the<br />
Aisne valley road for Dochamps. One<br />
company of armored infantry had been<br />
left to defend the b<strong>as</strong>e at Amonines.<br />
The detachment with Orr consisted of<br />
a company of armored infantry plus<br />
three medium and three light tanks.<br />
About 0900 the small American col-<br />
umn saw an enemy column coming up<br />
the road from Dochamps, and each<br />
halted to size up the other. T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Orr’s opponent w<strong>as</strong> the 1128th Regiment<br />
which, though reduced to a combat<br />
strength of seven hundred, w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
strongest unit in the 560th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division. As it happened a part<br />
of the German force had been pinned<br />
down by an attack against flank and<br />
rear thrown in by T<strong>as</strong>k Force Kane,<br />
but this intelligence w<strong>as</strong> unknown to<br />
Orr. The German commander disen-<br />
gaged from Kane, put in his engineer<br />
battalion to hold Dochamps, then moved<br />
to the ridge e<strong>as</strong>t of the valley road and<br />
began the fire fight. Shortly after noon<br />
Orr’s scouts on the ridge west of the<br />
valley reported more German troops<br />
moving northwest. This looked like a<br />
trap of some sort and Orr withdrew his<br />
column to the starting point on the crest<br />
at Amonines, w<strong>here</strong> he w<strong>as</strong> reinforced<br />
by infantry and tank destroyers. The<br />
1128th did not follow in force (T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Kane still threatened from the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t) but w<strong>as</strong> content to fire smoke shells<br />
onto the American position and probe<br />
with patrols. The troops in field gray<br />
seen moving west of the valley were the<br />
1129th Regiment en route to Beffe to re-<br />
lieve the 116th Panzer Division. They<br />
paid no attention to T<strong>as</strong>k Force Orr.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Kane, e<strong>as</strong>ternmost of the<br />
3d Armored detachments, obviously<br />
w<strong>as</strong> playing an important part in de-<br />
laying the German advance toward Amo-<br />
nines. The attack toward Dochamps,<br />
started the previous afternoon and re-<br />
sumed on the 22d, w<strong>as</strong> hampered by<br />
the necessity of keeping a blocking force<br />
at the Manhay junction and reinforcing<br />
the scratch defense farther south at the<br />
Baraque de Fraiture crossroads. De-<br />
spite the fact that T<strong>as</strong>k Force Kane w<strong>as</strong><br />
fighting with its left arm tied down,<br />
by noon the drive toward Dochamps<br />
reached the village of Lamormenil. Dur-<br />
ing these morning hours the American<br />
tanks proved too much for the German<br />
infantry; it is probable that an entire<br />
battalion of the 1128th w<strong>as</strong> engaged and<br />
siphoned away from the attack against<br />
Orr.<br />
The terrain beyond Lamormenil,<br />
however, w<strong>as</strong> distinctly adverse to ar-<br />
mored tactics. A single road wound<br />
southward through a narrow semi-<br />
wooded valley until, about eight hun-<br />
dred yards e<strong>as</strong>t of Dochamps, it climbed<br />
abruptly up the e<strong>as</strong>t face of a bare<br />
hill to reach the village. As soon <strong>as</strong>
384 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Kane’s tanks reached the foot of the<br />
hill German antitank guns started to<br />
work. Maneuver on the soft earth flank-<br />
ing the road promised that the tanks<br />
would bog down; attack straight along<br />
the road w<strong>as</strong> suicidal. After futile at-<br />
tempts at counterbattery against the<br />
enemy gunners the tanks withdrew to<br />
the north. Kane’s column had been<br />
short of infantry, and Dochamps pre-<br />
sented a problem to which the answer<br />
w<strong>as</strong> infantry.<br />
Just after dark t<strong>here</strong> appeared in the<br />
American bivouac six trucks carrying<br />
two officers and eighty men belong-<br />
ing to the 1st Battalion, 517th Para-<br />
chute Infantry. Lost from its convoy the<br />
detachment had been p<strong>as</strong>sed around<br />
from headquarters to headquarters,<br />
finally ending up with Kane. The para-<br />
troopers were handed the job of taking<br />
Dochamps, this time by an attack from<br />
the north guiding on a narrow-gauge<br />
railway which approached the village.<br />
Twice the detachment moved forward,<br />
only to meet machine gun fire from<br />
front and flank. The second try ended<br />
when the Germans counterattacked<br />
from a hill northwest of the village.<br />
More than a handful of infantry would<br />
be required if the 3d Armored Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> to regain control of the<br />
Dochamps-Samrée heights.<br />
The story of T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hogan on<br />
the 22d is quickly told. Cut off at Mar-<br />
couray, Hogan received radio orders to<br />
try once more to break out northe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
through Beffe. Little aid could be spared<br />
by the Americans in the north, but<br />
a small t<strong>as</strong>k force from CCA w<strong>as</strong> or-<br />
ganized to drive toward Hogan. T<strong>here</strong><br />
proved to be simply too many Germans<br />
between Beffe and the Soy-Hotton road.<br />
In any c<strong>as</strong>e, Hogan, who had been<br />
rushed into action with his tanks half<br />
full, w<strong>as</strong> running out of g<strong>as</strong>oline. In<br />
early afternoon his column retired to<br />
Marcouray and sent out requests for<br />
fuel, surgical supplies, and reinforce-<br />
ments. All this while the enemy knew<br />
Hogan’s exact w<strong>here</strong>abouts but paid<br />
him scant attention. When the 116th<br />
Panzer Division moved out on the<br />
night of 22 December, the com-<br />
mander of the 560th detailed some of<br />
his engineers to watch Hogan’s laager.<br />
The armored German kampfgruppe<br />
<strong>as</strong>tride the road between Soy and Hot-<br />
ton w<strong>as</strong> content to remain on the defen-<br />
sive pending its withdrawal southward,<br />
but the German tanks and antitank guns<br />
ruled <strong>as</strong> “King of the Rock” on the<br />
crest overwatching the road. Grooved<br />
by the road, the first American attack<br />
from Soy toward Hotton slammed<br />
straight into direct fire and lost six<br />
medium and two light tanks. Cross-<br />
country maneuver by infantry w<strong>as</strong> indi-<br />
cated. Long awaited, the 1st Battalion<br />
of the 517th Parachute Infantry and<br />
a company from the 643d Tank De-<br />
stroyer Battalion arrived in Soy at twi-<br />
light. Howze had expected to use the<br />
paratroopers in a daylight attack to re-<br />
open the Hotton road, but the division<br />
commander demanded an immediate<br />
commitment. Thrown into <strong>as</strong>sault over<br />
strange ground, only half an hour<br />
after crawling out of their trucks, the<br />
paratroopers made little headway against<br />
six German self-propelled guns and<br />
clusters of machine gun nests. By 2000<br />
the attack west from Soy w<strong>as</strong> stopped<br />
dead still.<br />
An alarm from Hotton, suddenly <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sailed after a day of quiet, forced a<br />
second try. This time Howze ordered<br />
two of the paratroop platoons, tank-sup-
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES; ANOTHER EMERGES 385<br />
ported, to circle around and into Hot-<br />
ton from the north, intending a squeeze<br />
play by attack in the dark from both<br />
Soy and Hotton. But neither claw w<strong>as</strong><br />
able to grip the enemy holding the<br />
core high ground. So the night ended.<br />
During its course the 560th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division had made a smooth<br />
and unperceived relief of the 116th<br />
Panzer Division. At dawn the grena-<br />
diers held an irregular front reaching<br />
from the Ourthe River e<strong>as</strong>t to the Ba-<br />
raque de Fraiture crossroads athwart<br />
the Liège-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway. This sec-<br />
tor from river to highway now formed<br />
the center of the LVIII Panzer Corps<br />
with the 2d SS Panzer Division moving<br />
in on the e<strong>as</strong>t and the 116th Panzer<br />
Division circling to form the western<br />
wing beyond the Ourthe.<br />
Events of the 22d had shown a move-<br />
ment of large German forces to the<br />
west, consequent to the fall of St. Vith,<br />
and brought the threat–epitomized<br />
by the appearance of the 2d SS Panzer<br />
Division–of a large-scale build-up for<br />
an attack to push through the XVIII<br />
Airborne Corps in a climactic, dramat-<br />
ic bid for Spa and Liège. The orders is-<br />
sued by General Ridgway on the night<br />
of 22 December, it will be remem-<br />
bered, were a detailed expression of the<br />
larger Allied plan to halt and then<br />
amputate the German forces swelling<br />
the western end of the salient, orders<br />
to hold the line or win more favorable<br />
positions while the VII Corps <strong>as</strong>sembled<br />
on the right flank and a counterattack<br />
to regain St. Vith formed on the left.<br />
Between the Ourthe River and the<br />
Liège-B<strong>as</strong>togne road the single combat<br />
command of the 3d Armored Division,<br />
now reinforced, had the mission on<br />
the 23d of building a forward line<br />
along the Salmchâteau-La Roche road<br />
<strong>as</strong> a breakwater against the anticipated<br />
German surge to the north. From the<br />
head of the enemy salient, between Soy<br />
and Hotton, to the Salmchâteau-La<br />
Roche road w<strong>as</strong> a distance of eleven<br />
miles. Attempts to get this counterat-<br />
tack moving in the night battles near<br />
Hotton and Dochamps had failed.<br />
Strength to do the job had incre<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
somewhat but far from enough to guar-<br />
antee success. With the main force of<br />
CCA west of the Ourthe and CCB still<br />
mopping up in Kumpfgruppe Peiper's<br />
stronghold, General Rose had available<br />
three tank battalions and four armored<br />
infantry companies of his own divi-<br />
sion. Newly arrived reinforcements had<br />
swelled the rifle contingent by two bat-<br />
talions, the 1st Battalion of the 517th<br />
Parachute Infantry and the 509th Para-<br />
chute Infantry Battalion. <strong>To</strong>tal artillery<br />
support consisted of the 105-mm. self-<br />
propelled howitzers belonging to the<br />
54th and 83d Armored Field Artillery<br />
Battalions, plus three self-propelled 155-<br />
mm. guns from the 991st Field Artil-<br />
lery Battalion–any unbalance of force<br />
favorable to the Germans hardly would<br />
be redressed by the weight of Ameri-<br />
can gun metal. In conference on the<br />
morning of the 23d the commanders of<br />
the XVIII Airborne and VII Corps<br />
agreed that Rose needed more troops.<br />
But the one battalion of the 75th In-<br />
fantry Division <strong>as</strong>signed could not reach<br />
the scene for some hours.<br />
The story of the 23d is one of local<br />
counterattacks to hold or restore exist-<br />
ing positions against an enemy who re-<br />
tained the initiative and maintained<br />
the momentum of the attack rolling<br />
northward. The critical point would be<br />
the Baraque de Fraiture crossroads at
386 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the boundary between the 3d Armored<br />
Division and the 82d Airborne Division,<br />
a point marking the thrust line along<br />
which the 2d SS Panzer Division intend-<br />
ed to proceed north. The action at this<br />
road junction, “Parker’s Crossroads,”<br />
requires independent treatment. It h<strong>as</strong><br />
bearing at this point because the small<br />
combat reserve available to the 3d Ar-<br />
mored Division would be drained away<br />
<strong>here</strong> and because American operations<br />
set in train to e<strong>as</strong>t and west would<br />
be conditioned by the shaky character<br />
of the 3d Armored left flank.<br />
In front of Dochamps T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Kane resumed the attack broken off in<br />
the early morning. German mortars lob-<br />
bing down 81-mm. and 120-mm. shells<br />
stopped the infantry on the slopes, and<br />
direct fire knocked out an entire platoon<br />
of Sherman tanks when they tried to <strong>as</strong>-<br />
cend the hill road. The plain fact w<strong>as</strong><br />
that Kane lacked the men, tanks, and<br />
guns to take Dochamps. But this w<strong>as</strong><br />
not all. During the day a part of the<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force had to be diverted to man<br />
roadblocks along the valley north to<br />
Grandmenil which w<strong>as</strong> both Kane’s<br />
flank and line of communications. In<br />
the afternoon the 1130th Regiment<br />
(possibly reduced to battalion strength)<br />
and an <strong>as</strong>sault gun platoon moved in<br />
from the west to cut the Dochamps-<br />
Grandmenil road. Fighting at Frey-<br />
neux and Lamorménil w<strong>as</strong> touch and<br />
go, but the enemy suffered badly and<br />
failed to gain the road. This maneuver<br />
from the west had been given top pri-<br />
ority by the 560th Volks Grenadier Di-<br />
vision. whose command w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong> anxious<br />
to er<strong>as</strong>e the Dochamps salient <strong>as</strong> Gen-<br />
eral Rose w<strong>as</strong> to pinch out the Hotton<br />
bulge.<br />
Sometime after dark the Germans hit<br />
the valley route again, but this time<br />
farther north and from the opposite<br />
side. Five light tanks and a squad of<br />
riflemen posted at Odeigne were set<br />
upon by enemy infantry who lighted<br />
their targets by flares and moved in<br />
with self-propelled 40-mm. guns to<br />
make the kill. The Americans held<br />
their ground until nearly surrounded,<br />
then-when so ordered-withdrew. This<br />
foray came from the Baraque de<br />
Fraiture crossroads sector, w<strong>here</strong> the 2d<br />
SS Panzer Division finally had broken<br />
through, and w<strong>as</strong> made by elements of<br />
the 3d Panzer Grenadier Regiment<br />
moving with much difficulty along the<br />
narrow forest trails south of Odeigne.<br />
Now T<strong>as</strong>k Force Kane would have to<br />
battle to hold its narrow corridor<br />
against an enemy closing in from both<br />
flanks and circling to the rear.<br />
In the center sector, at Amonines,<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Orr waited for CCR to wipe<br />
out the enemy between Soy and Hot-<br />
ton, then turn south in an attack with<br />
the two forces abre<strong>as</strong>t. With the ex-<br />
ception of the maneuver to clear the<br />
Americans out of the territory north<br />
of Dochamps described earlier, the<br />
560th Volks Grenadier Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
in no hurry to attack those American<br />
positions w<strong>here</strong> the defenders seemed<br />
willing and able to put up a stiff fight.<br />
After all, the German corps commander<br />
had promised the support of fresh <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault troops. T<strong>here</strong>fore, although the<br />
Germans pressed in around Amonines<br />
they made no move to tackle T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Orr.<br />
The vise created the night before to<br />
close on the German hill positions<br />
<strong>as</strong>tride the Soy-Hotton road compressed<br />
very slowly on the 23d, nor did the jaws<br />
meet. Radio communication between the
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES; ANOTHER EMERGES 387<br />
two American <strong>as</strong>sault forces failed to<br />
function in the morning, the Hotton<br />
group w<strong>as</strong> forced to spend much of the<br />
day mopping up the enemy who had<br />
seeped into the village during the night<br />
battle, and both the e<strong>as</strong>tern and western<br />
groups–when the attack finally started<br />
moving–were too weak to make head-<br />
way against German tanks and antitank<br />
guns firing from hull defilade on the<br />
high ground. Four tanks from the Soy<br />
force were knocked out in five minutes;<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little point in courting such<br />
losses and in any c<strong>as</strong>e t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> only a<br />
single tank still operating so the battle<br />
w<strong>as</strong> left to the infantry.<br />
Lacking the numbers needed to envel-<br />
ope the German position, the infantry<br />
turned to a fire fight that l<strong>as</strong>ted well into<br />
the night. Pfc. Melvin Biddle, a para-<br />
trooper, tried to carry the fight to the<br />
enemy by advancing in front of his own<br />
troops to throw grenades and pick off the<br />
enemy infantry with his rifle. (Later he<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the Medal of Honor.) But<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no apparent diminution in the<br />
enemy firepower and toward dawn the<br />
fight dwindled away. The rifle battalion<br />
promised from the 75th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion had not arrived.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hogan, out of g<strong>as</strong>oline and<br />
immobile in its ridge road laager at<br />
Marcouray, w<strong>as</strong> not hard pressed by the<br />
encircling German pickets. Enemy par-<br />
lementaires appeared during the after-<br />
noon with a demand for immediate<br />
surrender but were politely told that if<br />
they wanted Marcouray they could come<br />
and take it. <strong>To</strong> underline the isolation<br />
of the American force, a detachment of<br />
enemy infantry started an <strong>as</strong>sault; this<br />
promptly w<strong>as</strong> bl<strong>as</strong>ted by slugs pouring<br />
from the multiple .50-caliber machine<br />
guns carried by a half-track section of the<br />
486th Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion.<br />
Hogan had accompanied his radio re-<br />
port of the German surrender demand<br />
with a request for “maximum support.”<br />
CCR w<strong>as</strong> having its hands more than full<br />
in its own backyard on the 23d, and the<br />
Germans obviously could not be left to<br />
one side while a relief party went to aid<br />
Hogan. The immediate question then<br />
w<strong>as</strong> how to supply the t<strong>as</strong>k force and keep<br />
it in being until the tactical situation<br />
improved. The 54th Armored Field Ar-<br />
tillery Battalion w<strong>as</strong> near enough to<br />
Marcouray for an attempt to shoot med-<br />
ical supplies into Hogan’s lines. The<br />
gunners loaded howitzer shells with med-<br />
ical packets, using the same technique<br />
<strong>as</strong> with propaganda leaflets, but the<br />
supplies were so damaged on impact <strong>as</strong> to<br />
be worthless. Resupply by airdrop went<br />
awry. 3<br />
The position of the 3d Armored Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> me<strong>as</strong>urably more difficult by the<br />
end of the 23d. As in the days just p<strong>as</strong>t<br />
General Rose had the promise of some<br />
addition to his command, but thus far<br />
piecemeal reinforcement had failed to<br />
keep pace with growing enemy strength,<br />
much less create a balance. Late in the<br />
afternoon the 3d Armored Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
<strong>as</strong>signed to the VII Corps, which had<br />
<strong>as</strong>sumed the conduct of operations west<br />
of the Ourthe. Tactically the transfer<br />
made no marked change. Rose’s com-<br />
mand e<strong>as</strong>t of the Ourthe remained tied<br />
to the 82d Airborne Division and the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps, sharing the same<br />
terrain compartment and facing the<br />
same major enemy maneuver. General<br />
Collins, the VII Corps commander,<br />
3 A very complete and instructive analysis of<br />
the failure to resupply T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hogan by air<br />
is in Thompson’s MS, Air Supply to Isolated<br />
Units, pp. 34–63.
388 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
managed to provide some <strong>as</strong>sistance to<br />
the 3d Armored, during the night at-<br />
taching the 290th Infantry of the 75th<br />
Division and the 188th Field Artillery<br />
Battalion, whose 155-mm. howitzers<br />
would provide a weight and range sadly<br />
deficient in the artillery supporting<br />
Rose.<br />
Even so, the coming day promised to<br />
be grim. All plans for counterattack to<br />
regain the La Roche–Salmchâteau line<br />
were dismissed. The critical hour w<strong>as</strong> at<br />
hand. General Rose told the CCR com-<br />
mander, “Impress on every individual<br />
that we must stay right <strong>here</strong> or t<strong>here</strong> will<br />
be a war to be fought all over again,<br />
and we won’t be <strong>here</strong> to fight it.” The<br />
560th Volks Grenadier Division could be<br />
held, had been held. Could the 3d Ar-<br />
mored Division and the troops forming<br />
the western wing of the 82d Airborne<br />
Division throw back the fresh 2d SS Pan-<br />
zer Division, which had already punched<br />
a deep hole at the interdivision bound-<br />
ary, and hold other German forces be-<br />
lieved to be moving into the battle zone?<br />
The Fight at the Baraque de Fraiture<br />
Crossroads, 23 December<br />
Baraque de Fraiture is a handful of<br />
buildings at a crossroads south of the<br />
Belgian hamlet of Fraiture. T<strong>here</strong> are<br />
many such crossroads in the Belgian<br />
Ardennes, but this crossing of ways<br />
stands on one of the highest summits of<br />
BARAQUE DE FRAITURE
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES; ANOTHER EMERGES 389<br />
the Ardennes, a small shelf or tableland<br />
at an elevation of 652 meters (2,139<br />
feet). The roads which <strong>here</strong> intersect<br />
are important: N15, the north-south<br />
road, is the through paved highway link-<br />
ing Liège and B<strong>as</strong>togne; N28, the e<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
west road, is cl<strong>as</strong>sed <strong>as</strong> secondary but is<br />
the most direct route for movement<br />
along the northern side of the Ourthe<br />
River, connecting, for example, St. Vith<br />
with La Roche. The crossroads and the<br />
few buildings are on cleared ground, but<br />
heavy woods form a crescent to the north<br />
and west, and a fringe of timber points<br />
at the junction from the southe<strong>as</strong>t. In the<br />
main the area to south and e<strong>as</strong>t is com-<br />
pletely barren. Here the ground de-<br />
scends, forming a glacis for the firing<br />
parapet around the crossroads.<br />
The tactical stature of the Baraque de<br />
Fraiture intersection w<strong>as</strong> only partially<br />
derived from the configuration of roads<br />
and terrain. The manner in which the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps had deployed its<br />
units in the initial attempt to draw a<br />
cordon along the northwest flank of the<br />
German advance w<strong>as</strong> equally important.<br />
The mission <strong>as</strong>signed the three recon-<br />
naissance forces of the 3d Armored Divi-<br />
sion had been to close up to the Liège-<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne highway (with the crossroads<br />
<strong>as</strong> an objective), but it had not been<br />
carried out. E<strong>as</strong>t of the same highway the<br />
82d Airborne had deployed, but with its<br />
weight and axis of advance away from the<br />
crossroads. Circumstance, notably the<br />
direction of the German attacks from 20<br />
December onward, left the Baraque de<br />
Fraiture crossroads, and with it the inner<br />
flanks of the two divisions, to be de-<br />
fended on a strictly catch-<strong>as</strong>-catch-can<br />
b<strong>as</strong>is.<br />
On the afternoon of 19 December<br />
Maj. Arthur C. Parker III, led three<br />
105-mm. howitzers of the ill-starred<br />
589th Field Artillery Battalion on the<br />
crossroads. The rest of the battalion had<br />
been cut off on the Schnee Eifel or am-<br />
bushed during the withdrawal to St.<br />
Vith. Parker’s mission w<strong>as</strong> to establish<br />
one of the roadblocks that the 106th<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> preparing behind St. Vith.<br />
The next day, four half-tracks mounting<br />
multiple .50-caliber machine guns ar-<br />
rived from the 203d Antiaircraft Artil-<br />
lery Battalion, now moving in with the<br />
7th Armored Division to establish the<br />
defensive lines around St. Vith. That<br />
night, for the first time, vehicles were<br />
heard moving about to the south along<br />
the road to Houffalize. (They probably<br />
belonged to the 560th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division, which that afternoon had taken<br />
part in the capture of Samrée.) Before<br />
dawn an 80-man enemy patrol came up<br />
the road from Houffalize, stumbled onto<br />
the American half-tracks, and w<strong>as</strong> cut to<br />
pieces by streams of bullet fire. The dead<br />
and prisoners were grenadiers from the<br />
560th, but among them w<strong>as</strong> an officer<br />
from the 2d SS Panzer Division, scouting<br />
out the route of advance for his incoming<br />
division. In the afternoon D Troop of<br />
the 87th Cavalry Squadron, earlier<br />
dispatched by the 7th Armored to<br />
aid T<strong>as</strong>k Force Orr in the projected<br />
counterattack at Samrée, came in to join<br />
the crossroads garrison. The troop leader<br />
had gone to Dochamps to meet Orr but,<br />
finding Germans in the town, disposed<br />
his men and vehicles under orders from<br />
General H<strong>as</strong>brouck that the crossroads<br />
must be held.<br />
Fog settling over the tableland in late<br />
afternoon gave the enemy a chance to<br />
probe the defense erected at the cross-<br />
roads, but these jabs were no more than<br />
a warning of things to come. Meanwhile
390 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
eleven tanks and a reconnaissance pla-<br />
toon arrived from T<strong>as</strong>k Force Kane. The<br />
Americans spent the night of 21 Decem-<br />
ber ringed around the crossroads, tanks<br />
alternating with armored cars in a stock-<br />
ade beyond which lay the rifle line.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no sign of the enemy despite<br />
reports from all sorts of sources that Ger-<br />
man armor w<strong>as</strong> gathering at Houffalize.<br />
Messengers coming in from the head-<br />
quarters of the 3d Armored and 82d Air-<br />
borne Divisions brought the same<br />
message, “Hold <strong>as</strong> long <strong>as</strong> you can.”<br />
General Gavin w<strong>as</strong> especially con-<br />
cerned by the threat to the 82d flank<br />
developing at the crossroads and went to<br />
talk the matter over with Rose at his<br />
command post in Manhay. The 3d Ar-<br />
mored commander <strong>as</strong>sured Gavin that<br />
his troops would continue to cover the<br />
western wing of the 82d Airborne. Gavin<br />
nevertheless acted at once to send the 2d<br />
Battalion, 325th Glider Infantry, from<br />
his division reserve to defend Fraiture,<br />
the latter on a ridge three-quarters of a<br />
mile northe<strong>as</strong>t of Parker’s crossroads<br />
position. In addition, having made a per-<br />
sonal reconnaissance of the area, Gavin<br />
told Col. Charles Billingslea, the regi-<br />
mental commander, to dispatch a com-<br />
pany of the glider infantry to reinforce<br />
the crossroads defenders. The 2d Battal-<br />
ion reached Fraiture before dawn on the<br />
22d, and Capt. Junior R. Woodruff led<br />
F Company into the circle around the<br />
crossroads just before noon. This slight<br />
reinforcement w<strong>as</strong> negated when Kane<br />
took away his tanks to stiffen the attack<br />
going on in front of Dochamps.<br />
The day of 22 December w<strong>as</strong> spent in<br />
waiting. The 2d SS Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
having ‘fuel troubles and moving in fits<br />
and starts. Mortar fire, laid on by the<br />
German reconnaissance screen left in<br />
this area <strong>as</strong> the 560th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division advanced northwest, from time<br />
to time interrupted movement in and<br />
out of the crossroads position. That w<strong>as</strong><br />
all. During the day the 3d Armored had<br />
received some reinforcements; these were<br />
parceled out across the front with a pla-<br />
toon from the 643d Tank Destroyer Bat-<br />
talion going to the crossroads. En route<br />
south from Manhay on the night of the<br />
22d the tank destroyer detachment lost<br />
its way and halted some distance north<br />
of the crossroads. German infantry sur-<br />
prised and captured the platoon in the<br />
early morning. Already the 2d SS Pan-<br />
zer Division w<strong>as</strong> moving to cut off and<br />
er<strong>as</strong>e the crossroads garrison. Attack w<strong>as</strong><br />
near at hand, a fact made clear when an<br />
officer patrol from the 2d SS w<strong>as</strong> cap-<br />
tured at dawn in the woods near the<br />
American foxholes.<br />
At daylight, shelling incre<strong>as</strong>ed at the<br />
crossroads <strong>as</strong> German mortar and gun<br />
crews went into position; yet the long<br />
awaited <strong>as</strong>sault hung fire. The re<strong>as</strong>on<br />
w<strong>as</strong> lack of fuel. The 2d SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sion had only enough g<strong>as</strong>oline to move<br />
its Reconnaissance Battalion on the 2 1st<br />
and this had been committed near Viel-<br />
salm. All through the 22d the division<br />
waited in its final <strong>as</strong>sembly are<strong>as</strong>. <strong>To</strong>-<br />
ward evening enough fuel arrived to set<br />
the 4th Panzer Grenadier Regiment,<br />
some tanks, and an artillery battalion to<br />
moving. In the course of the night the<br />
grenadiers relieved the small reconnais-<br />
sance detachments of the 560th, which<br />
had been watching the crossroads, and<br />
filed through the woods to set up a cor-<br />
don west and north of Baraque de<br />
Fraiture. The commander of the 4th<br />
Panzer Grenadier had placed his 2d<br />
Battalion on the right of the main north-<br />
south highway, while his 3d Battalion
ONE THREAT SUBSIDES; ANOTHER EMERGES 391<br />
deployed around and to the rear of the<br />
crossroads. In the dark hours before<br />
dawn of the 23d the first move came,<br />
<strong>as</strong> the 2d Battalion made a surprise at-<br />
tack on Fraiture and w<strong>as</strong> driven back<br />
after a bitter fight with the para-<br />
troopers. 4<br />
The surprise attack at Fraiture having<br />
aborted, the Germans settled down to<br />
hem in and soften up the crossroads de-<br />
fense. Radios that had been taken from<br />
captured American vehicles were used<br />
to jam the wave band on which the<br />
American forward observers were calling<br />
for fire, Whenever word fl<strong>as</strong>hed over the<br />
air that shells were on their way, enemy<br />
mortar crews dumped shells on Amer-<br />
ican observation posts–e<strong>as</strong>ily discernible<br />
in the limited perimeter–making sens-<br />
ing virtually impossible. Late in the<br />
morning Lt. Col. Walter B. Richardson,<br />
who had a small force backing up Kane<br />
and Orr, sent more infantry and a pla-<br />
toon of tanks toward the crossroads. By<br />
this time the German grenadiers occu-<br />
pied the woods to the north in sufficient<br />
strength to halt the foot soldiers. The<br />
American tanks, impervious to small<br />
arms fire, reached the perimeter at about<br />
1300, w<strong>here</strong>upon the rifle line pushed<br />
out to e<strong>as</strong>t and south to give the tankers<br />
a chance to maneuver.<br />
But at the crossroads time w<strong>as</strong> running<br />
out. Shortly after 1600 the German ar-<br />
tillery really got to work, for twenty<br />
minutes pummeling the area around the<br />
crossroads. Then, preceded by two pan-<br />
zer companies (perhaps the final <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
had waited upon their appearance), the<br />
entire rifle strength of the 4th Panzer<br />
Grenadier Regiment closed upon the<br />
Americans. Outlined against new-fallen<br />
4 The main actions of the 2d SS Panzer in this<br />
sector are developed <strong>as</strong> a part of Chapter XXIII.<br />
snow the line of defense w<strong>as</strong> clearly vis-<br />
ible to the panzers, and the Shermans<br />
had no maneuver room in which to back<br />
up the line. The fight w<strong>as</strong> brief, moving<br />
to a foregone conclusion. At 1700 the<br />
commander of F Company <strong>as</strong>ked Bill-<br />
ingslea for permission to withdraw; but<br />
Gavin’s order still w<strong>as</strong> “hold at all<br />
costs.” Within the next hour the Ger-<br />
mans completed the reduction of the<br />
crossroads defense, sweeping up prison-<br />
ers, armored cars, half-tracks, and the<br />
three howitzers. Three American tanks<br />
managed to escape under the veil of half-<br />
light. Earlier they had succeeded in<br />
spotting some panzers, who were firing<br />
flares, and knocked them out. A number<br />
of men escaped north through the woods;<br />
some got a break when a herd of cattle<br />
stampeded near the crossroads, providing<br />
a momentary screen. Company F of the<br />
325th Glider Infantry suffered the most<br />
but stood its ground until Billingslea<br />
gave permission to come out. Ultimately<br />
forty-four of the original one hundred<br />
sixteen who had gone to the crossroads<br />
returned to their own lines. Dr<strong>as</strong>tically<br />
outnumbered and unable to compensate<br />
for weakness by maneuver, the defenders<br />
of the Baraque de Fraiture crossroads<br />
had succumbed, like so many small forces<br />
at other crossroads in the Ardennes.<br />
The dent made <strong>here</strong> at the boundary<br />
between the 3d Armored and the 82d<br />
Airborne Divisions could all too quickly<br />
develop into a ragged tear, parting the<br />
two and unraveling their inner flanks.<br />
The next intersection on the Liège road,<br />
at Manhay, w<strong>as</strong> only four miles to the<br />
north. From Manhay the lateral road be-<br />
tween Trois Ponts and Hotton would<br />
place the Germans on the deep flank and<br />
rear of both divisions. Generals Rose and<br />
Gavin reacted to this threat at once; so
392 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
did General Ridgway. Order followed<br />
order, but t<strong>here</strong> remained a paucity of<br />
means to implement the orders. The def-<br />
icit in reserves w<strong>as</strong> somewhat remedied<br />
by the troops of the 106th Division and<br />
the 7th Armored who, all day long, had<br />
been pouring through the lines of the<br />
82d Airborne after the hard-fought bat-<br />
tle of St. Vith. 5 General Hoge, CCB, 9th<br />
Armored commander, had been told at<br />
noon to send his 14th Tank Battalion to<br />
bolster the right flank of the 82d. One<br />
tank company went to the Manhay cross-<br />
roads; the rest moved into Malempré,<br />
two miles to the southe<strong>as</strong>t and off the<br />
Liège highway. Coincident with the Ger-<br />
man attack at Baraque de Fraiture<br />
General Hoge received a torrent of re-<br />
ports and orders. By this time Hoge w<strong>as</strong><br />
not sure <strong>as</strong> to either his attachment or<br />
mission. He finally gat<strong>here</strong>d that the<br />
5 The final withdrawal from St. Vith into the<br />
lines of the XVIII Airborne Corps is described at<br />
length in the following chapter.<br />
Baraque de Fraiture crossroads had been<br />
lost and CCB w<strong>as</strong> to join the defense al-<br />
ready forming on the road to Manhay.<br />
As darkness settled and the enemy re-<br />
formed to continue the attack beyond<br />
the crossroads, Maj. Olin F. Brewster<br />
formed a strongpoint at the north edge<br />
of a fringe of woods about 3,000 yards<br />
north of Baraque de Fraiture. T<strong>here</strong> he<br />
placed Company C of the 509th Para-<br />
chute Infantry Battalion, which earlier<br />
had failed to break through from the<br />
north with Richardson’s tanks, a platoon<br />
of armored infantry, and a tank platoon.<br />
With straggling tanks and infantry drift-<br />
ing in from the south and a platoon of<br />
tank destroyers sent in by General Hoge,<br />
Brewster’s force grew. All through the<br />
night German infantry tried to filter p<strong>as</strong>t<br />
and on toward Manhay, but when morn-<br />
ing came Brewster’s command still stood<br />
between the 2d SS Panzer Division and<br />
Manhay. A new and critical ph<strong>as</strong>e of<br />
operations w<strong>as</strong> about to open–the battle<br />
for the Manhay crossroads.
The Defenders of St. Vith P<strong>as</strong>s to the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps<br />
CHAPTER XVII<br />
On the morning of 20 December the<br />
Americans defending St. Vith held the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>ternmost position of any organized<br />
nature in the center sector of the Ar-<br />
dennes battleground. The most advanced<br />
elements of the German drive by this<br />
time were twenty-five air-line miles to<br />
the southwest of St. Vith. The St. Vith<br />
perimeter, now of substantial size, con-<br />
tinued to act <strong>as</strong> a breakwater holding the<br />
LXVI Corps in check while other Ger-<br />
man units forged westward p<strong>as</strong>t its north-<br />
ern and southern extensions. As yet the<br />
enemy forces p<strong>as</strong>sing to the north and<br />
south had failed to coalesce to the west<br />
of the St. Vith perimeter. The northern<br />
penetration, represented at its tip by the<br />
1st SS Panzer Division, remained narrow<br />
and road-bound. Well to the rear of the<br />
1st SS the 9th SS Panzer Division, rein-<br />
forced by the 519th Heavy Antitank<br />
Battalion, w<strong>as</strong> toiling slowly westward on<br />
the single, free main road which served<br />
<strong>as</strong> the main supply route for two armored<br />
and two infantry divisions. The advance<br />
guard had arrived near Recht the pre-<br />
vious evening, The southern advance,<br />
which had carried a m<strong>as</strong>s of German ar-<br />
mor and infantry from the XLVII and<br />
LVIII Panzer Corps toward B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
and Houffalize, had the troops and the<br />
maneuver room to constitute a real<br />
threat to the southern and western sec-<br />
St. Vith Is Lost<br />
tions of the St. Vith perimeter. The Ger-<br />
man successes in this area had already<br />
isolated the St. Vith forces from the re-<br />
mainder of the VIII Corps, although a<br />
slim connection remained between the<br />
7th Armored Division rear installations<br />
at La Roche and the VIII Corps head-<br />
quarters at B<strong>as</strong>togne. Communication<br />
between the 7th Armored rear head-<br />
quarters and the St. Vith command post<br />
(thirty-five miles by road) w<strong>as</strong> extremely<br />
difficult. Communication between the<br />
VIII Corps headquarters and the St. Vith<br />
command post w<strong>as</strong> almost nonexistent,<br />
even by radio.<br />
The road to Spa and the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
headquarters, albeit roundabout and<br />
hazardous, remained open on the morn-<br />
ing of the 20th. Thither the 7th Armored<br />
Division commander sent a liaison offi-<br />
cer (Lt. Col. Frederic Schroeder) with a<br />
letter to the First <strong>Army</strong> chief of staff,<br />
Maj. Gen. William B. Kean, and orders<br />
to explain that St. Vith w<strong>as</strong> out of touch<br />
with the VIII Corps. The letter, safely<br />
delivered, gave the First <strong>Army</strong> its first<br />
definite picture of events in the far-<br />
removed St. Vith sector:<br />
Dear Bill:<br />
I am out of touch with VIII Corps and<br />
understand XVIII Airborne Corps is<br />
coming in.<br />
My division is defending the line St.<br />
Vith–Poteau both inclusive. CCB, 9th AD,<br />
the 424th Inf Regt. of the 106th Div and<br />
the 112th Inf Regt of the 28th Div are on<br />
my right and hold from St. Vith (excl)
ST. VITH
ST. VITH IS LOST 395<br />
to Holdingen. Both infantry regiments are<br />
in bad shape. My right flank is wide open<br />
except for some reconnaissance elements,<br />
TDs and stragglers we have collected and<br />
organized into defense teams at road<br />
centers back <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Cheram [Chérain]<br />
inclusive. Two German Divisions, 116 Pz<br />
and 560 VG, are just starting to attack<br />
NW with their right on Gouvy. I can delay<br />
them the rest of today maybe but will be<br />
cut off by tomorrow.<br />
VIII Corps h<strong>as</strong> ordered me to hold and<br />
I will do so but need help. An attack from<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne to the NE will relieve the situa-<br />
tion and in turn cut the b<strong>as</strong>tards off in<br />
rear. I also need plenty of air support. Am<br />
out of contact with VIII Corps so am<br />
sending this to you. Understand 82AB is<br />
coming up on my north and the north<br />
flank is not critical. BOB HASBROUCK<br />
The First <strong>Army</strong> headquarters w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
process of drafting plans for uniting the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps and the St. Vith<br />
force when General H<strong>as</strong>brouck’s letter<br />
arrived. General Hodges’ answer, dis-<br />
patched at 1230, stated:<br />
Ridgway with armor and infantry is<br />
moving from west to gain contact with you.<br />
When communication is established you<br />
come under command of Ridgway. You<br />
retain under your command following<br />
units: 106th Inf Div, RCT 112, and CCB<br />
9th Armed Div. . . . [Ridgway] holds<br />
Malmédy, Stavelot and Trois Ponts. . . .<br />
For the first time since forming the St.<br />
Vith perimeter the force t<strong>here</strong> knew<br />
what me<strong>as</strong>ures were under way for its<br />
reinforcement or relief <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> the<br />
precise status of command within the<br />
force. Thus far General H<strong>as</strong>brouck and<br />
General Jones, the two division com-<br />
manders, had directed the units in the<br />
perimeter on a b<strong>as</strong>is of mutual agree-<br />
ment, although H<strong>as</strong>brouck, with the<br />
largest force in his own command, made<br />
most of the decisions. As the 7th Ar-<br />
mored commander phr<strong>as</strong>ed it: “I never<br />
knew who w<strong>as</strong> in my command. I just<br />
did everything I thought necessary. The<br />
command status w<strong>as</strong> more or less of an<br />
<strong>as</strong>sumption.” Actually the perimeter<br />
held from St. Vith westward w<strong>as</strong> so large<br />
and the defending units so thoroughly<br />
mixed that command functioned on an<br />
area b<strong>as</strong>is, even after the receipt of the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> order, with the 106th Divi-<br />
sion headquarters continuing to direct<br />
the defense south and southwest of St.<br />
Vith. 1<br />
<strong>To</strong> the surprise of the St. Vith forces<br />
this day (the 20th) p<strong>as</strong>sed rather quietly.<br />
Only a few feeble German jabs were di-<br />
rected against the American line, which<br />
on its e<strong>as</strong>tern face had been strengthened<br />
by a series of withdrawals to more favor-<br />
able ground during the previous night.<br />
The American positions were much bet-<br />
ter integrated than on previous days: the<br />
7th Armored Division artillery and at-<br />
tached battalions-of particular impor-<br />
tance the one medium tank battalion-<br />
were tied in closely with the troops they<br />
supported. Finally, the enemy w<strong>as</strong> under<br />
compulsion to reconnoiter anew the out-<br />
lines of the American e<strong>as</strong>tern front which<br />
had been redrawn during the night of<br />
19 December. German reports covering<br />
activity on the 20th <strong>as</strong>sume the defense<br />
of the St. Vith area <strong>as</strong> much stronger than<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> in fact. The enemy w<strong>as</strong> much im-<br />
1 The exchange between the commanders in-<br />
volved in the St. Vith defense will be found in<br />
the G–3 journals of the XVIII Corps, the 7th<br />
Armored Division, and the 106th Division. The<br />
military student will be interested in the delay<br />
between the dispatch of the various messages and<br />
their receipt. For the l<strong>as</strong>t ph<strong>as</strong>e of the battle see<br />
Boyer, St. Vith; CCB, 9th Armored, journal and<br />
AAR; the various battalion journals cited in<br />
Chapter XIX; and General Matthew B. Ridgway,<br />
Soldier: The Memoirs of Matthew B. Ridgway<br />
(New York: Harper & Brothers, 1956).
396 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
pressed by the collection of American<br />
armor confronting him–“tanks were<br />
everyw<strong>here</strong>,” said the 18th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division–and by the amount of ar-<br />
tillery fire his every movement attracted.<br />
It must be added, however, that<br />
Lucht’s LXVI Corps w<strong>as</strong> not in position<br />
to bring off the sm<strong>as</strong>hing attack against<br />
St. Vith which had been set tentatively<br />
for the 20th. The Fuehrer Begleit Bri-<br />
gade, whose tanks were supposed to add<br />
new punch to operations of the infantry<br />
corps, w<strong>as</strong> still strung out along the<br />
jammed and miry roads e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith.<br />
Its commander, Colonel Remer, impa-<br />
tient with delay, had ordered an <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
west of Wallerode at midnight on the<br />
19th, but the small detachment of ar-<br />
mored infantry and <strong>as</strong>sault guns at hand<br />
came under shellfire each time it formed<br />
for attack and Remer finally gave over<br />
the whole idea. Before daylight some of<br />
his tanks arrived in the woods west of<br />
Born. Having convinced the corps com-<br />
mander that direct attack on St. Vith<br />
from the e<strong>as</strong>t w<strong>as</strong> no longer fe<strong>as</strong>ible, Re-<br />
mer tried to make good on his own<br />
favored plan for an armored flanking at-<br />
tack in the north even at the risk of a<br />
piecemeal effort.<br />
Taking advantage of a heavy fog which<br />
rose in midafternoon, Remer sent a tank<br />
company through Ober-Emmels and up<br />
the slope west of Hünningen. American<br />
90-mm. tank destroyers from the 814th<br />
Tank Destroyer Battalion, waiting on<br />
the reverse slope, caught the first wave<br />
of four Panthers in their sights, fired<br />
seven rounds, and knocked out all four.<br />
Remer’s battalion of armored infantry<br />
and two <strong>as</strong>sault gun batteries, waiting in<br />
reserve in the valley below, never were<br />
committed. This then w<strong>as</strong> the extent of<br />
the Fuehrer Begleit effort on the 20th;<br />
Remer decided to await the arrival of<br />
the full brigade. 2<br />
E<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith the 18th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division w<strong>as</strong> regrouping <strong>as</strong> it waited<br />
for its artillery and trains, involved in<br />
the traffic jam caused by the Fuehrer<br />
Begleit columns. As usual, attempts to<br />
bring up the horse-drawn caissons p<strong>as</strong>t<br />
the armor only resulted in more delay<br />
and confusion. The division commander,<br />
General Hoffmann-Schönborn, did try a<br />
piecemeal attack on the high ground<br />
north of the Schönberg road with the in-<br />
tent to seize the St. Vith railroad station.<br />
He personally accompanied the 295th<br />
Regiment in the <strong>as</strong>sault. The attacking<br />
troop <strong>as</strong>sembled in Wallerode toward<br />
midmorning w<strong>here</strong> they offered wonder-<br />
ful targets for the artillery supporting<br />
CCB, 7th Armored. The gunners, <strong>as</strong> in-<br />
fantry observers reported, “threw every-<br />
thing at Wallerode but the shoes on their<br />
feet.” Within half an hour the German<br />
regimental commander w<strong>as</strong> hors de com-<br />
bat and the attack dissipated.<br />
South of St. Vith, w<strong>here</strong> CCB, 9th Ar-<br />
mored, had redressed its lines during the<br />
previous night consonant with the 7th<br />
Armored position on the left and taken<br />
over a five-mile front, the enemy made<br />
some attempt to press westward. The<br />
62d Volks Grenadier Division had been<br />
given the mission of cutting the possible<br />
escape routes southwest of St. Vith by an<br />
advance through Grufflange and Maldin-<br />
gen. The fact that this attack, launched<br />
about 1630 by the German center and<br />
left, miscarried w<strong>as</strong> due <strong>as</strong> much to the<br />
enemy’s failure to locate the new line of<br />
The detailed recital of the Fuehrer Begleit<br />
actions, supported by documents and memorabilia,<br />
is given in Die Geschichte Des Panzerkorps<br />
Grossdeutschland (Bielefeld 1958) , vol. 2, Teil<br />
VIII (<strong>here</strong>after cited <strong>as</strong> Panzerkorps G-D).
ST. VITH IS LOST 397<br />
defense <strong>as</strong> to American resistance. The<br />
190th Regiment advanced in close for-<br />
mation toward the 27th Armored Infan-<br />
try Battalion, almost <strong>as</strong> if in route march,<br />
and took a terrible beating from artillery,<br />
mortars, tank destroyers, antitank guns<br />
on ground mounts, and machine guns.<br />
The 164th Regiment, advancing oppo-<br />
site the southern flank of CCB, reported<br />
success while moving unopposed through<br />
M<strong>as</strong>pelt and across ground which had<br />
been abandoned the previous night, but<br />
at a crossroads in the Grufflange woods<br />
American shells suddenly poured in and<br />
the advance came to a dead stop. Pris-<br />
oners subsequently told of very severe<br />
losses <strong>here</strong> in the forest. 3<br />
Although action had flared up on 20<br />
December along the e<strong>as</strong>tern face of the<br />
St. Vith perimeter, the feature of this<br />
day w<strong>as</strong> the series of rearrangements to<br />
tighten the perimeter on the north and<br />
south. H<strong>as</strong>brouck earlier had been “sus-<br />
picious” of what w<strong>as</strong> happening in the<br />
northern sector around Recht and Po-<br />
teau, but he w<strong>as</strong> no longer too apprehen-<br />
sive after the successive march groups of<br />
the 1st SS Panzer Division had bounced<br />
off the 7th Armored Division roadblocks.<br />
The gap between the western anchor of<br />
the north flank at Vielsalm and the e<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
ern outposts of the 82d Airborne Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> closed toward the end of the<br />
day when patrols from the 505th Para-<br />
chute Infantry met a reconnaissance<br />
party from the 7th Armored south of<br />
Trois Ponts. In addition light tanks be-<br />
longing to the 87th Cavalry Reconnais-<br />
sance Squadron had established radio<br />
3 The operations of the LXVI Corps around St.<br />
Vith are described in MSS #B–026 (Hauser);<br />
B–333 (Pcht); and B–688 (Moll). The midday<br />
and evening reports on OB WEST KTB are par-<br />
ticularly useful.<br />
contact with the 3d Armored t<strong>as</strong>k force<br />
north of Samrée. On the whole it appeared<br />
that the north flank of the St.<br />
Vith force shortly would be battened<br />
down at its western terminus and that<br />
the danger of a German turning movement<br />
t<strong>here</strong> had been removed.<br />
The main danger, apparent since 19<br />
December, w<strong>as</strong> the open south flank of<br />
the St. Vith defense hanging on the air<br />
at Holdingen. It w<strong>as</strong> known that a German<br />
move northwest toward this open<br />
flank w<strong>as</strong> in process-indeed the 116th<br />
Panzer Division and the 560th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division had been identified.<br />
Furthermore the 7th Armored trains had<br />
reported signs of an enemy force far to<br />
the west of the 7th Armored outpost<br />
positions. Acutely aware of the<br />
threat now forming, General H<strong>as</strong>brouck<br />
stripped such elements <strong>as</strong> he dared from<br />
his north flank, added the remnants of<br />
the 14th Cavalry Group, and created<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jones (Lt. Col. Robert B.<br />
Jones, Commanding <strong>Of</strong>ficer, 814th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion) to guard the south<br />
and southwestern flank. Admittedly this<br />
scratch force w<strong>as</strong> too weak to make a serious<br />
defense in the endangered sector,<br />
but it could be expected to block the key<br />
road junctions and sound a warning<br />
should the enemy attempt any flanking<br />
movement.<br />
Colonel Jones organized three small<br />
detachments to occupy Deifeld, Gouvy,<br />
and Chérain, a screening position a little<br />
over six miles from e<strong>as</strong>t to west. Deifeld<br />
w<strong>as</strong> occupied without trouble. The high<br />
ground commanding Chérain, seven<br />
miles northe<strong>as</strong>t of Houffalize at the junction<br />
of the roads from Vielsalm and St.<br />
Vith which led to that town, w<strong>as</strong> organized<br />
for defense without enemy<br />
hinderance. By chance the Chérain de-
398 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tachment received reinforcement late in<br />
the afternoon when a company of the<br />
112th Infantry appeared. At an earlier<br />
and more optimistic hour this com-<br />
pany had been dispatched to Houffalize<br />
with orders to make a counterattack<br />
southward to relieve the pressure on<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. The company commander<br />
w<strong>as</strong> persuaded that the situation had<br />
changed somewhat and that he should<br />
wait at Chérain for further orders. A<br />
little later a company of German infan-<br />
try w<strong>as</strong> detected marching north along<br />
the valley toward Chérain. During the<br />
night a few of the enemy entered the<br />
village but quickly were driven out. Gen-<br />
eral H<strong>as</strong>brouck decided to wait further<br />
developments before committing any of<br />
his meager reserves at Chérain.<br />
The detachment which Jones had sent<br />
to Gouvy, midway between Deifeld and<br />
Chérain, w<strong>as</strong> surprised to find the village<br />
occupied by German infantry. On 18<br />
December the 7th Armored had learned<br />
in a roundabout way that a “Lieutenant<br />
Colonel named Stone” had collected a<br />
few troops and w<strong>as</strong> holding Gouvy. Sub-<br />
sequently H<strong>as</strong>brouck sent a platoon of<br />
light tanks to help out and an injunction<br />
that it w<strong>as</strong> “imperative” that the village<br />
be held. All through the day and night of<br />
19 December German vehicles (units of<br />
the 116th Panzer Division and the ad-<br />
vance guard of the 560th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division) had rolled p<strong>as</strong>t Gouvy to<br />
the south and west, but no attempt had<br />
been made to repeat the attack of the<br />
previous day. Stone sent out one of his<br />
staff to try to line up some help; this<br />
officer discovered the command post of<br />
the 965th Field Artillery Battalion, near<br />
the town of Beho, and put forth the c<strong>as</strong>e<br />
of the Gouvy defenders “who were at-<br />
tempting to hold the line despite their<br />
not being trained infantrymen.” Battery<br />
C had been <strong>as</strong>signed to support the<br />
112th Infantry and with the consent of<br />
the latter shifted its 155-mm. howitzers<br />
to give Stone’s men a hand,<br />
Actually the pick-up force of quarter-<br />
m<strong>as</strong>ter troops, light tanks, and stragglers<br />
under Stone’s command w<strong>as</strong> deployed so<br />
<strong>as</strong> to defend the railhead stocks at Gouvy<br />
Station e<strong>as</strong>t of the village proper, but<br />
this fact w<strong>as</strong> unknown to the 7th Ar-<br />
mored Division headquarters. During<br />
the night of 19 December the bulk of the<br />
1130th Regiment, 560th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division, bivouacked in and west of<br />
the village of Gouvy. This regiment,<br />
which had sent combat patrols against<br />
Stone’s force on the 18th, w<strong>as</strong> at the tail<br />
end of the LVIII Panzer Corps columns<br />
pushing p<strong>as</strong>t Houffalize. It had become<br />
embroiled with the 112th Infantry at<br />
Sevenig, had suffered intensely (the<br />
fighting strength of the regiment now<br />
w<strong>as</strong> between five and six hundred), and<br />
had been unable to disengage in the Our<br />
River sector <strong>as</strong> quickly <strong>as</strong> the rest of the<br />
division. The LVIII Panzer Corps com-<br />
mander w<strong>as</strong> anxious to get the 1130th up<br />
to cover his right rear and had ordered<br />
the regiment to seize and block the St.<br />
Vith–Houffalize road in the neighbor-<br />
hood of Gouvy and Chérain.<br />
In midmorning of 20 December the<br />
Germans in the village deployed skir-<br />
mishers and began a fire fight to test the<br />
American strength around the station.<br />
After three hours of this the Americans<br />
observed the enemy going into attack<br />
formation in an open field next to the<br />
village church. Using the church spire <strong>as</strong><br />
a reference point the cannoneers of Bat-<br />
tery C opened fire, their 155-mm. how-<br />
itzers scattering the German formation<br />
in every direction. When the 7th Ar-
ST. VITH IS LOST<br />
CHÉRAIN. A disabled German self-propelled gun is in the foreground.<br />
mored detachment arrived to set up the<br />
Gouvy roadblock, it found the Germans<br />
inside the village. The detachment drove<br />
them out in a sharp fight but at nightfall<br />
withdrew to a road junction a mile and<br />
a half to the west, <strong>here</strong> blocking any<br />
further German move toward the north.<br />
Stone’s group w<strong>as</strong> incorporated in T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Jones. The next day it w<strong>as</strong> able,<br />
with some pride, to turn over to the 7th<br />
Armored Division the 350 German<br />
prisoners it had guarded since 18 De-<br />
cember and the stores at the railhead.<br />
Possession of the First <strong>Army</strong> ration<br />
dumps at Gouvy Station w<strong>as</strong> a boon to<br />
the units in the St. Vith–Vielsalm de-<br />
fense, for by 20 December the 7th Ar-<br />
mored Division trains for all practical<br />
purposes were cut off from the forward<br />
399<br />
combat elements. On this day it w<strong>as</strong> nec-<br />
essary to instruct all unit commanders<br />
that the rations, water, and g<strong>as</strong>oline on<br />
hand must be made to l<strong>as</strong>t for three days.<br />
The eight battalions of field artillery<br />
taking part in the defense were put on a<br />
strict ration, seven rounds for each 105-<br />
mm. howitzer, to fire only on the most<br />
urgent and well-defined targets. Har<strong>as</strong>s-<br />
ing and interdiction fire, t<strong>here</strong>fore, w<strong>as</strong><br />
turned over to the mortar crews, who<br />
mixed high explosives and white phos-<br />
phorous shells to make the supply l<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
Fortunately the stock of artillery shells<br />
w<strong>as</strong> replenished (for the first time in<br />
three days) from the Samrée dump be-<br />
fore it w<strong>as</strong> overrun by the enemy. An<br />
attempt to give greater weight to the<br />
artillery in the St. Vith–Vielsalm area
400 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
failed when the 4.5-inch guns of the<br />
770th Field Artillery Battalion were cut<br />
off at Samrée en route from La Roche.<br />
Even when separated from the 7th<br />
Armored trains the St. Vith front w<strong>as</strong><br />
considerably stronger and better organ-<br />
ized than it had been. Incidentally, the<br />
quick and forceful reaction to all Ger-<br />
man probing during the day and the fact<br />
that H<strong>as</strong>brouck had kept only a very<br />
small reserve out of the line had created<br />
an impression of American strength in<br />
the enemy headquarters well beyond the<br />
fact. The front held by the 7th Armored<br />
Division, CCB of the 9th Armored, and<br />
attached units by this time had expanded<br />
to about thirty-two miles. Traced on the<br />
map the line <strong>as</strong>sumed the form of a<br />
horseshoe, the bend at St. Vith, the open<br />
prongs facing west. This opening had<br />
been partially covered by the advance<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>tward of the 82d Airborne Divi-<br />
sion, but a gap of some five miles still<br />
existed north of the Chérain outpost set<br />
up by T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jones.<br />
The VIII Corps p<strong>as</strong>sed to General<br />
Patton’s Third <strong>Army</strong> during the 20th.<br />
Word of this, handed down by Colonel<br />
Ryan who had been at the VIII Corps<br />
headquarters in Neufchâteau and had<br />
worked his way back to the division<br />
trains, caused a little confusion <strong>as</strong> to the<br />
exact status of the units attached to the<br />
7th Armored Division. In the early eve-<br />
ning CCB, 9th Armored Division, re-<br />
ceived orders to revert to the VIII Corps<br />
and move that same night to St. Hubert,<br />
seventeen miles west of B<strong>as</strong>togne. The<br />
loss of this combat command would<br />
create a wide breach in front of the<br />
enemy congregating south of St. Vith, a<br />
breach which hardly could be filled by<br />
the l<strong>as</strong>t reserves at H<strong>as</strong>brouck’s disposal.<br />
The 7th Armored commander, at Hoge’s<br />
request, got Middleton to cancel the or-<br />
der, and CCB, 9th Armored, subse-<br />
quently w<strong>as</strong> taken under the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
command. The attachment already exist-<br />
ing w<strong>as</strong> thus legalized. What H<strong>as</strong>brouck<br />
needed now he tersely relayed in a mes-<br />
sage through the 7th Armored trains to<br />
the XVIII Airborne Corps: “We can<br />
hold if no troops are taken away from us<br />
and our right rear is given protection.”<br />
The addition of the 7th Armored<br />
Division to the XVIII Airborne Corps<br />
had contributed greatly to the phenom-<br />
enal expansion of a corps front which<br />
me<strong>as</strong>ured only some twenty-five miles on<br />
19 December but which represented a<br />
sector of approximately eighty-five miles<br />
on the evening of 20 December. On the<br />
19th most of Ridgway’s troops had en-<br />
gaged in patrolling with no enemy con-<br />
tact; on the 20th the XVIII Airborne<br />
Corps faced the westernmost elements of<br />
the I SS Panzer Corps, the entire LXVI<br />
Corps, and the LVIII Panzer Corps.<br />
Additional infantry units, tank destroy-<br />
ers, and badly needed artillery were on<br />
their way to reinforce Ridgway’s com-<br />
mand, but the enemy force in opposition<br />
w<strong>as</strong> strong and at most points along the<br />
extended front the initiative remained<br />
in German hands.<br />
Whether the XVIII Airborne Corps<br />
could maintain the freshly added burden<br />
imposed by the 7th Armored Division<br />
salient remained to be seen. But that the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps lacked the<br />
strength to close the gap of thirteen road<br />
miles between the VIII Corps and itself<br />
(that is, the gap between the 7th Ar-<br />
mored Division detachment at Chérain<br />
and the elements of the 101st Airborne<br />
at Foy) w<strong>as</strong> rapidly becoming apparent<br />
to all. The corps’ mission, <strong>as</strong> it had de-<br />
volved by the end of the day, would be
ST. VITH IS LOST<br />
this: pivoting on Malmédy, to continue<br />
the advance to the southe<strong>as</strong>t and e<strong>as</strong>t with<br />
“utmost vigor,” driving back the German<br />
forces found west of the line Malmédy-<br />
Pont-Vielsalm-Hebronval-Houffalize.<br />
That the enemy w<strong>as</strong> prepared to con-<br />
test this move all intelligence reports<br />
affirmed. True, Kampfgruppe Peiper<br />
had been pretty well bottled up on the<br />
corps left wing; but this effort had been<br />
made by thinning the line between<br />
Malmédy and Trois Ponts. First <strong>Army</strong><br />
intelligence sources carried word of an<br />
enemy force building up <strong>here</strong> south of<br />
the 30th Division, a matter of consider-<br />
able concern to Generals Ridgway and<br />
Hobbs by the night of 20 December. Fur-<br />
thermore, it w<strong>as</strong> recognized that Peiper<br />
might try to break out through Stavelot.<br />
German documents, taken in the fight at<br />
Gouvy, showed clearly the intention of<br />
the LVIII Panzer Corps to drive on<br />
Hotton, at the moment the location of<br />
the 3d Armored Division command post.<br />
Already the advance guard of this force<br />
had pushed beyond Samrée. The St. Vith<br />
salient, w<strong>here</strong> the 7th Armored Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to remain on the defensive during<br />
the XVIII Airborne advance, w<strong>as</strong> con-<br />
fronted with growing German forces on<br />
three sides. Prisoners had reported that<br />
the Grossdeutschland Panzer Division,<br />
previously identified on the E<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
Front, had joined the LXVI Corps be-<br />
fore St. Vith. Even though the new ar-<br />
mored outfit did not prove to be the<br />
famous division but Remer’s much<br />
weaker panzer brigade, the report w<strong>as</strong><br />
of particular concern.<br />
The Enemy Closes on the<br />
St. Vith Salient<br />
The St. Vith salient looked like this<br />
401<br />
by the morning of the 21st:<br />
on the north<br />
and e<strong>as</strong>t the line w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong> well organized<br />
<strong>as</strong> the forces available would permit; the<br />
southern flank had been somewhat rein-<br />
forced and prolonged by a covering<br />
screen extending westward; the 82d Air-<br />
borne Division w<strong>as</strong> in position to give<br />
some support in the northwestern seg-<br />
ment of the gap to the rear of the 7th<br />
Armored and 106th Infantry Division;<br />
and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a fair number of light<br />
batteries supporting the front and flanks<br />
of the salient. Although rationing had<br />
begun, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no immediate threat<br />
that food, g<strong>as</strong>oline, or ammunition<br />
would fail. The piecemeal German at-<br />
tacks on the 20th had been turned back<br />
with little loss or difficulty. Command<br />
relations under the XVIII Airborne<br />
Corps had been clarified (the 106th w<strong>as</strong><br />
no longer attached to the 7th Armored)<br />
and communications established. For<br />
the first time the two divisions holding<br />
the salient had some clear picture of the<br />
dispositions and plans of neighboring<br />
friendly units. No one could say with<br />
certainty, of course, what strength the<br />
enemy w<strong>as</strong> preparing for the final <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
to gain St. Vith. (See Map VII.)<br />
The Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, constantly<br />
prodded by the higher staffs and acutely<br />
aware that the St. Vith road net must<br />
be opened to allow forward movement<br />
of the reinforcements needed to main-<br />
tain the momentum of the advance to-<br />
ward the Meuse, w<strong>as</strong> in no mood for<br />
further delay. General Manteuffel w<strong>as</strong><br />
anxious to free the LXVI Corps and<br />
hurry it forward to the Salm River sec-<br />
tor <strong>as</strong> right wing cover for the two pan-<br />
zer corps. General Model hoped to shake<br />
the corps free and use Remer’s armor to<br />
help the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> get moving<br />
in the north. Lucht, t<strong>here</strong>fore, w<strong>as</strong> or-
402 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
dered to make an all-out attack and take<br />
St. Vith itself on 21 December, whether<br />
or not the Fuehrer Begleit Brigade w<strong>as</strong><br />
ready. This, one of his division com-<br />
manders opined, w<strong>as</strong> e<strong>as</strong>ier said than<br />
done.<br />
The course of battle on 21 December<br />
initially affirmed the pessimistic view<br />
with which most of German unit com-<br />
manders seem to have started the attack.<br />
Remer, still missing most of his tanks,<br />
had been instructed to drive from<br />
Nieder-Emmels straight south into St.<br />
Vith. South of Nieder-Emmels the St.<br />
Vith road crossed the ridge w<strong>here</strong>, the<br />
day before, the American tank destroyers<br />
had broken the back of the German at-<br />
tack before it could get rolling. The<br />
Fuehrer Begleit commander, with the in-<br />
dependence that characterized the ac-<br />
tions of a man who stood ace-high with<br />
Hitler, decided to shift the attack and<br />
take Rodt (Sart-lez-St. Vith) , about two<br />
and a half miles west of his <strong>as</strong>signed ob-<br />
jective. The rifle battalion <strong>as</strong>signed to<br />
carry out this mission happened to come<br />
under American artillery fire while <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembling west of Nieder-Emmels be-<br />
fore dawn, or thus Remer explains the<br />
failure to strike Rodt. So he compro-<br />
mised by sending a large combat patrol<br />
into the woods west of that village with<br />
orders to find a covered route along<br />
which the tanks might advance on Viel-<br />
salm once they arrived.<br />
The section of the main St. Vith-<br />
Vielsalm supply road west of Rodt w<strong>as</strong><br />
guarded by two American medium tank<br />
companies spread over a distance of<br />
three miles. It w<strong>as</strong> e<strong>as</strong>y for the German<br />
infantry to move unnoticed through the<br />
heavy timber. They even succeeded in<br />
ambushing enough vehicles, p<strong>as</strong>sing<br />
back and forth along the road, to prom-<br />
ise motorization of the brigade’s bicycle<br />
battalion. The American tankers caught<br />
on to what had happened when mes-<br />
sengers and liaison officers failed to<br />
arrive at their destinations, but by this<br />
time the Germans had journeyed on to<br />
the southwest. Near Hinderhausen they<br />
attempted to surprise the 275th Ar-<br />
mored Field Artillery Battalion, an out-<br />
fit that had been exposed to close-quarter<br />
fighting before. With the help of two<br />
tanks and an antiaircraft artillery half-<br />
track mounting the dreaded .50-caliber<br />
quad, the artillerymen beat off the. at-<br />
tack. When the raiders turned back to<br />
rejoin Remer they found the American<br />
tankers waiting: however, ev<strong>as</strong>ion in the<br />
woods w<strong>as</strong> e<strong>as</strong>y, although at this point<br />
the prized vehicles were abandoned and<br />
most of the captured Americans escaped.<br />
Meanwhile Remer’s amored group had<br />
arrived north of St. Vith and the brigade<br />
w<strong>as</strong> ready for attack <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> darkness<br />
came.<br />
On most of the front held by the 7th<br />
Armored and the troops of the 9th Ar-<br />
mored and 106th the morning p<strong>as</strong>sed in<br />
ominous quiet. Patrols working in front<br />
of the American lines came back with<br />
reports of enemy activity and movement:<br />
some kind of an attack w<strong>as</strong> in the offing<br />
but it seemed slow in coming. Appar-<br />
ently the German corps command had<br />
some difficulty in organizing a co-ordi-<br />
nated and well-timed advance over the<br />
broken and wooded ground around St.<br />
Vith. In fact, he had not reached the com-<br />
manders of his two infantry divisions<br />
with orders until daylight. The center<br />
regiment of the 62d Volks Grenadier<br />
Division (the 190th) , charged with seiz-<br />
ing the high ground in the thick forest<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Grufflange, did get one battalion<br />
under way in the morning and succeeded
ST. VITH IS LOST 403<br />
in overrunning an armored infantry pla-<br />
toon and three tank destroyers belong-<br />
ing to CCB, 9th Armored. Once the<br />
element of surprise w<strong>as</strong> lost the Germans<br />
made no further headway in the forest;<br />
artillery and bullet fire held them until<br />
a platoon of American tanks arrived,<br />
w<strong>here</strong>upon they withdrew. 4<br />
The American defense of St. Vith it-<br />
self w<strong>as</strong> b<strong>as</strong>ed on the possession of ridge<br />
lines and hills m<strong>as</strong>king the town to the<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t, e<strong>as</strong>t, and southe<strong>as</strong>t. Two<br />
draws cut through this shield of high<br />
ground, one on the north represented by<br />
the highway running from Büllingen in-<br />
to St. Vith, the other angling from the<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t and traversed by the road and<br />
railroad line from Prüm. Directly e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of St. Vith ran the Schönberg highway,<br />
which had been the avenue of the very<br />
first German attacks, but this road ran<br />
over a ridge just outside St. Vith w<strong>here</strong><br />
the Americans had stood successfully to<br />
meet all previous enemy thrusts. Much<br />
of the area <strong>here</strong> described w<strong>as</strong> covered<br />
with dense stands of timber spaced<br />
irregularly with clearings between. Con-<br />
necting the Büllingen and Schönberg ap-<br />
proaches a spider web of secondary roads<br />
and trails ran back and forth, centering<br />
at the hamlet of Wallerode (two miles<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith) behind which lay<br />
a large forest. It w<strong>as</strong> <strong>here</strong> that the un-<br />
successful attacks launched earlier by the<br />
4 During the skirmish around Grufflange Cpl.<br />
Horace M. Thorne, Troop D of the 89th Cavalry<br />
Reconnaissance Squadron, led a patrol to scout<br />
out the enemy location. He killed the crew of an<br />
immobilized enemy tank, set up a light machine<br />
gun on the tank deck, and t<strong>here</strong> conducted a fire<br />
fight in which he personally accounted for two<br />
machine gun crews. He w<strong>as</strong> killed by rifle fire<br />
while trying to clear a stoppage on his weapon.<br />
Corporal Thorne w<strong>as</strong> awarded the Medal of<br />
Honor.<br />
18th Volks Grenadier Division and the<br />
Fuehrer Begleit Brigade had formed.<br />
Faced with the problem of organizing<br />
and integrating a defensive line which<br />
had come into being piecemeal and with<br />
little regard to the integrity of the tactical<br />
units involved, the Americans divided<br />
command responsibility along<br />
e<strong>as</strong>ily discerned map features. Thus the<br />
draws coming in from the southe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
marked the boundary between CCB of<br />
the 9th Armored and CCB, 7th Armored,<br />
while the northern defile and the<br />
Büllingen road designated the boundary<br />
between two sector commands within<br />
CCB, 7th Armored. The e<strong>as</strong>ternmost defenses,<br />
<strong>as</strong> a result, were in the sector<br />
bounded by the Prüm road on the right<br />
and the Büllingen road on the left, susceptible<br />
to penetration at either flank or<br />
both. This sector w<strong>as</strong> under Lt. Col.<br />
William H. G. Fuller (commanding<br />
officer of the 38th Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion) , whose command consisted of<br />
four companies of armored infantry,<br />
Troop B of the 87th Reconnaissance<br />
Squadron, and some four hundred men<br />
remaining from the 81st and 168th Engineer<br />
Combat Battalions (the men who<br />
had taken the first enemy blows at St.<br />
Vith), backed up by a tank company<br />
and a platoon of self-propelled 90-mm.<br />
tank destroyers.<br />
The frontal attack planned by the<br />
LXVI Corps commander, under pressure<br />
for a quick victory, would be mounted<br />
by the 18th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
and the 62d Volks Grenadier Division,<br />
whose highly successful envelopment<br />
tactics e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith had bagged prisoners<br />
finally counted on this day <strong>as</strong> approaching<br />
eight thousand. The main<br />
effort would be made by the 18th in the<br />
north and the 183d Regiment from the
404 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
right wing of the 62d, this force attack-<br />
ing in the sector outlined by the two<br />
draws w<strong>here</strong> Colonel Fuller’s command<br />
w<strong>as</strong> deployed. <strong>To</strong> the right of the main<br />
effort Remer’s brigade w<strong>as</strong> under or-<br />
ders to enter St. Vith by direct <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
from the northwest via the Hunningen<br />
road, orders which he subsequently dis-<br />
obeyed. <strong>To</strong> the left the two remaining<br />
regiments of the 62d were to attack due<br />
west with the object of reaching the road<br />
between St. Vith and Maldingen; they<br />
would take no part, however, in the <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault on St. Vith.<br />
By prodigious effort the LXVI Corps<br />
artillery finally had been wormed<br />
through the traffic jam e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith,<br />
and towed and manhandled into posi-<br />
tion. Around 1400 the German guns and<br />
Werfers opened up against Fuller’s posi-<br />
tions in front of the town. West of<br />
Wallerode the 295th Regiment started<br />
into the <strong>as</strong>sault, possibly only <strong>as</strong> a feint,<br />
but withdrew <strong>as</strong> the guns supporting<br />
CCB, 7th Armored, went into action.<br />
This gambit w<strong>as</strong> succeeded by a fifteen-<br />
minute artillery concentration; <strong>as</strong> it<br />
raised westward the main German attack<br />
moved forward. It w<strong>as</strong> now about 1600<br />
hours.<br />
One of the heaviest and longest-sus-<br />
tained barrages the veteran American<br />
combat command had ever encountered<br />
tied the troops of CCB to their foxholes,<br />
and even t<strong>here</strong> tree bursts claimed<br />
many a victim. On both sides of the<br />
main Schönberg road the 294th Regi-<br />
ment moved groups of forty to fifty men<br />
forward in bounds through the woods. A<br />
platoon of Sherman tanks stationed just<br />
north of the road w<strong>as</strong> caught in the<br />
thickest of the German concentrations.<br />
Three lost their commanders and the<br />
platoon withdrew. The first German<br />
waves then hit between Company A of<br />
the 38th Armored Infantry Battalion<br />
and Company A of the 23d Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion. Meanwhile the 293d<br />
Regiment had pushed south of the<br />
Schönberg highway toward Company B<br />
of the 38th Armored Infantry Battalion,<br />
Troop B, 87th Reconnaissance Squad-<br />
ron, and Company A, 81st Combat<br />
Engineers, left to right. Only two<br />
medium tanks were barring the road.<br />
For some re<strong>as</strong>on this attack never fully<br />
developed–later German reports indi-<br />
cated that the <strong>as</strong>sault waves lost their<br />
direction while moving through the<br />
thick woods. Suddenly, about 1700,<br />
the German pressure along the Schön-<br />
berg road e<strong>as</strong>ed. The enemy had found<br />
a soft spot and w<strong>as</strong> regrouping while<br />
his tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns moved for-<br />
ward. General Lucht ordered the com-<br />
mander of the 18th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division to throw everything he had<br />
behind the 294th and continue the at-<br />
tack.<br />
North of the threatened area the<br />
295th Regiment had come out of the<br />
woods behind Wallerode and started an<br />
advance southwest, covered by <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
gun or tank fire from the ridge west<br />
of the town. This move brought the<br />
grenadiers across open ground and<br />
under flanking fire from American tanks<br />
located by the railroad underp<strong>as</strong>s just<br />
north of St. Vith. At the same time Com-<br />
pany A of the 38th Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion fired into their ranks from the<br />
front. American artillery joined in, the<br />
attack broke, and the 295th streamed<br />
back from whence it had come.<br />
At 2000 the battle along the Schön-<br />
berg road flared up again. This w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
end. Most of the American troops were<br />
killed or captured, so that only a condi-
ST. VITH IS LOST 405<br />
tional reconstruction of the German<br />
breakthrough e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith can ever<br />
be made. The American units flanking<br />
the road had been badly understrength<br />
before the 21st, but the lengthy and de-<br />
structive barrage laid down by the enemy<br />
had caused very severe c<strong>as</strong>ualties and<br />
shaken the defenders. Sustained shelling<br />
had also destroyed all means of com-<br />
munication, except by runner, and left<br />
the little groups isolated and unable to<br />
support one another. Troop B of the<br />
87th Reconnaissance Squadron and Com-<br />
pany A of the 81st Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion, both directly in the German<br />
path, probably numbered less than forty<br />
men apiece when the final blow fell.<br />
It appears that if t<strong>here</strong> were any mines<br />
left on the Schönberg road they had<br />
been lifted in preparation for a promised<br />
counterattack by American tanks.<br />
Actually t<strong>here</strong> were only three Sher-<br />
mans on the main road, remnant of a<br />
reserve platoon which had been com-<br />
mandeered when the initial tank sup-<br />
port had decamped. During the earlier<br />
lull the enemy infantry worked through<br />
the thick woods, penetrating the thin<br />
and disordered American line at a<br />
number of points. The final <strong>as</strong>sault,<br />
made by the 294th and one or two pla-<br />
toons of Tigers, simply peeled the<br />
Americans back on both sides of the<br />
road. The three Shermans had aimed<br />
their guns to bl<strong>as</strong>t the first tanks <strong>as</strong><br />
they came over the ridge w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
American foxhole line had been drawn.<br />
In the darkness, and with radios and<br />
wire no longer functioning, the first sign<br />
of the enemy armor w<strong>as</strong> a volley of<br />
flares fired in flat trajectory from the<br />
Panthers. Silhouetted in light and with<br />
blinded crews the Shermans were dis-<br />
posed of in one, two, three order. In<br />
a matter of minutes German infantry<br />
and tanks were to the rear of the foxhole<br />
line. Lt. Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> J. Riggs, Jr., com-<br />
mander of the 81st Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion, who had tried to organize a<br />
counterattack to wipe out the earlier<br />
penetrations w<strong>as</strong> lost trying to organize<br />
a l<strong>as</strong>t-ditch defense in the hamlet of<br />
Prümerberg on the main road. No with-<br />
drawal orders reached the troops now<br />
behind the enemy. Some held w<strong>here</strong><br />
they were; some stampeded blindly<br />
through the woods in search of an exit to<br />
the west.<br />
A double column of enemy troops and<br />
vehicles marched along the road into<br />
St. Vith. On the right of Colonel Fuller’s<br />
sector Company B of the 23d Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion and a platoon of the<br />
814th Tank Destroyer Battalion, after<br />
having withstood almost continuous <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault for four hours, succumbed about<br />
the same time to the 183d Regiment,<br />
which attacked along the draw from<br />
the southe<strong>as</strong>t between CCB, 7th Ar-<br />
mored, and CCB, 9th Armored. The<br />
183d Regiment now poured through the<br />
draw into St. Vith. Two of the American<br />
tank destroyers reached St. Vith and <strong>here</strong><br />
blocked the main street until nearly mid-<br />
night, when one w<strong>as</strong> destroyed by a<br />
bazooka round. <strong>Of</strong> the force originally<br />
commanded by Colonel Fuller in the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern sector only some two hundred<br />
escaped, and half of these had to be<br />
evacuated for wounds or exhaustion.<br />
The loss <strong>here</strong> of the four armored in-<br />
fantry companies would be keenly felt<br />
by CCB, 7th Armored Division.<br />
General Clarke, the CCB, 7th Ar-<br />
mored Division, commander, could do<br />
little to influence the course of the battle.<br />
Communications were gone and he had<br />
no reserves. About 2130 he ordered what
406 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
w<strong>as</strong> left of his command to fall back<br />
to the high ground west of the city,<br />
planning to anchor the new line on those<br />
of his troops who were still intact in<br />
the Nieder-Emmels sector, northwest of<br />
St. Vith. The troops e<strong>as</strong>t of St. Vith<br />
simply had to be written off (at le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
600 officers and men) although some<br />
later would be able to work their way<br />
back through the German lines.<br />
The new defense ordered by Clarke<br />
began to form shortly before midnight.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> a ragged, piecemeal affair about<br />
two miles long, running south from<br />
Hünningen along the chain of hills a<br />
thousand yards west of St. Vith. Lt. Col.<br />
Robert C. Erlenbusch (Commanding<br />
<strong>Of</strong>ficer, 3 1st Tank Battalion) w<strong>as</strong><br />
charged with the organization of this new<br />
position. He and Lt. Col. Robert L. Rhea<br />
(Commanding <strong>Of</strong>ficer, 23d Armored In-<br />
fantry Battalion), who had taken over<br />
from Colonel Fuller when the latter w<strong>as</strong><br />
evacuated because of exhaustion, were<br />
able to restore some me<strong>as</strong>ure of confi-<br />
dence and order. CCB, 7th Armored<br />
Division, be it remembered, w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
battle-tested outfit of superior morale-<br />
<strong>as</strong> w<strong>as</strong> the entire division–so credit also<br />
must go to the unnamed officers,<br />
noncoms, and men who withdrew in<br />
good order to the new line. Fortunately,<br />
the enemy, too, had to regroup before<br />
he resumed the battle,<br />
CCB, 9th Armored, also made read-<br />
justments to meet the new situation.<br />
General Clarke had informed General<br />
Hoge, whose command post w<strong>as</strong> close<br />
at hand, that his command w<strong>as</strong> moving<br />
back to re-form west of St. Vith. Since<br />
the shift would leave Hoge’s northern<br />
flank open, it w<strong>as</strong> agreed that contact<br />
between the two combat commands<br />
would be re-established at Bauvenn,<br />
necessitating that Hoge’s left be pulled<br />
back some two thousand yards. This w<strong>as</strong><br />
accomplished. The remainder of CCB,<br />
9th Armored Division, remained in the<br />
positions on the ridge line west of the<br />
Braunlauf Creek and draw.<br />
About 2200 General Clark reached<br />
General H<strong>as</strong>brouck with word of what<br />
had happened at St. Vith and the latter<br />
immediately informed the XVIII Air-<br />
borne Corps. But this w<strong>as</strong> not all that<br />
the 7th Armored Division commander<br />
had to report. Earlier, T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jones<br />
(deployed on the southern flank of the<br />
salient) had captured a German engi-<br />
neer officer who, under questioning,<br />
said that his division, the 2d SS Panzer<br />
Division, w<strong>as</strong> moving toward Gouvy.<br />
Thus far the 2d SS Panzer Division had<br />
not been located. Its presence on the<br />
weak southern flank (in c<strong>as</strong>e the cap-<br />
tured officer w<strong>as</strong> not a “plant”) w<strong>as</strong><br />
disturbing. Apparently General H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck accepted the veracity of the re-<br />
port (he could hardly risk the chance<br />
that it w<strong>as</strong> not true) and so recom-<br />
mended that General Ridgway send the<br />
3d Armored Division e<strong>as</strong>t and south to<br />
meet this new enemy. Already H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck had ordered T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jones to<br />
shorten its line because the l<strong>as</strong>t reserve<br />
available behind the southern wing (the<br />
17th Tank Battalion) w<strong>as</strong> en route to re-<br />
inforce CCB. Without Wemple’s tanks,<br />
or with them, T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jones w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
match for any large detachment of the<br />
2d SS Panzer Division.<br />
The First <strong>Army</strong> commander still ex-<br />
pected, on the night of the 21st, that<br />
Ridgway’s corps would shortly gain con-<br />
tact with the 7th Armored–but the<br />
situation w<strong>as</strong> deteriorating at a f<strong>as</strong>t clip.<br />
After a h<strong>as</strong>ty meeting of his corps staff<br />
the XVIII Airborne commander sent
ST. VITH IS LOST 407<br />
new orders to H<strong>as</strong>brouck (it w<strong>as</strong> now<br />
about 0200 on the 22d). The 424th and<br />
112th Infantry Regiments were to with-<br />
draw from their positions. The entire<br />
force under Generals H<strong>as</strong>brouck and<br />
Jones w<strong>as</strong> to form a defensive ring west<br />
of St. Vith and e<strong>as</strong>t of the Salm River.<br />
By early morning of the 22d the with-<br />
drawal of the southernmost units w<strong>as</strong><br />
under way and the circle w<strong>as</strong> beginning<br />
to form. The command situation finally<br />
w<strong>as</strong> “regularized” when Ridgway gave<br />
Maj. Gen. Alan W. Jones the com-<br />
mand of the 7th Armored Division<br />
(he ranked Brig. Gen. Robert W.<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck) in addition to his own divi-<br />
sion and its attachments. Actually this<br />
change had no effect on the conduct<br />
of subsequent operations and w<strong>as</strong><br />
effective for only a few hours.<br />
A perimeter defense by units cut off<br />
from the rest of the XVIII Airborne<br />
Corps w<strong>as</strong> a very temporary expedient;<br />
the ground now occupied, in the opinion<br />
of the local commanders, could not be<br />
held for long. General Clark later<br />
phr<strong>as</strong>ed the problem thus:<br />
In studying the map of the area it will<br />
be noted that the troops were to be dis-<br />
posed surrounding a forest through which<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a paucity of roads. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
practically no possibility of being able to<br />
shift forces to meet a threat at any point.<br />
HOW units were to be supplied in such<br />
a situation is not understood. Air supply<br />
of such a large and scattered force would<br />
have been most difficult. Without supply<br />
the force would have been through in two<br />
or three days.<br />
Fortunately for the forces in the sali-<br />
ent the withdrawal to the “goose egg”<br />
defense, a move made with extreme<br />
difficulty on muddy and congested roads<br />
and trails, w<strong>as</strong> unhampered in its first<br />
ph<strong>as</strong>es by any German reaction. The<br />
occupation of St. Vith had considerably<br />
disorganized the attacking division,<br />
whose regiments jammed into the town<br />
from e<strong>as</strong>t, north, and south. Orders given<br />
the 18th Volks Grenadier Division early<br />
on the 22d to continue the attack along<br />
the main road through Rodt and Poteau<br />
toward the Salm River could not be<br />
carried out for some hours. On the left<br />
the bulk of the 62d Volks Grenadier<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> still confronted with an un-<br />
broken defense. The only force in posi-<br />
tion for an immediate exploitation w<strong>as</strong><br />
Remer’s Fuehrer Begleit Brigade, whose<br />
tanks finally had arrived on the evening<br />
of 21 December.<br />
The Final Withdrawal from<br />
the St. Vith Sector<br />
The raid made by Remer’s infantry<br />
p<strong>as</strong>t Rodt now paid dividends. Having<br />
found a negotiable route for his heavy<br />
vehicles, Remer prepared to capture<br />
Rodt, cut the main road between that<br />
village and Vielsalm, and overrun such<br />
of the American batteries <strong>as</strong> remained<br />
in the way. In the midst of a snowstorm,<br />
sometime around midnight of the 21st,<br />
Remer’s tank group and his armored<br />
infantry started along the narrow trails<br />
winding through the thick woods north<br />
of the Rodt-Vielsalm road. By daybreak<br />
the Fuehrer Begleit advance guard had<br />
arrived at the edge of the forest north<br />
of Rodt. This small village, 4,000 yards<br />
west of St. Vith, lay on the reverse slope<br />
of a ridge line along which extended<br />
the north flank of the 7th Armored Divi-<br />
sion. Here a number of secondary roads<br />
entered the St. Vith–Vielsalm highway,<br />
one from Recht in the north, others from<br />
Hinderhausen and Crombach in the<br />
south. As a result of the regrouping
408<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
TANKOF THE 7TH ARMORED DIVISION in a temporary position near St. Vith.<br />
under way in the 7th Armored zone,<br />
Rodt w<strong>as</strong> the junction point between<br />
CCA, still holding the division north<br />
flank, and CCB, raising a new line along<br />
the low hill chain that extended south of<br />
the village. The ground at Rodt, then,<br />
overlooked the flank and rear of CCB.<br />
The village itself w<strong>as</strong> garrisoned by<br />
the service company of the 48th Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion and some drivers be-<br />
longing to the battalion whose vehicles<br />
were parked t<strong>here</strong>. Astride the woods<br />
road running north to Recht were small<br />
blocking detachments of tanks, engi-<br />
neers, and antitank guns. Between Rodt<br />
and the next village to the west, Poteau,<br />
two companies of medium tanks pa-<br />
trolled the main road and watched the<br />
trails running in from the north. <strong>To</strong> the<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t the troop from CCB which<br />
originally had held the left wing of the<br />
St. Vith sector around Hünningen w<strong>as</strong><br />
still in position; <strong>as</strong> yet it had not<br />
sustained any heavy blows.<br />
As light broke, the right battalion of<br />
Remer’s brigade attacked to cut the main<br />
western road close to Poteau. The<br />
German <strong>as</strong>sault <strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> beaten off by<br />
the drivers in a vehicle park who used<br />
the .50-caliber machine guns on their<br />
two-score half-tracks in a withering<br />
fusillade. In the e<strong>as</strong>t, at Rodt, Remer’s<br />
left battalion tried to rush the village<br />
from the woods but ran straight into<br />
artillery fire. Some of the Germans made<br />
it to the houses and defended them-
ST. VITH IS LOST 409<br />
selves in the cellars, but most of the<br />
battalion finally had to pull back. A<br />
number of prisoners were later rounded<br />
up by the Americans on the Recht road.<br />
The second German <strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong> made in<br />
a more methodical manner. First,<br />
mortars went to work against houses<br />
and foxholes. Then the German tank<br />
group, which had been delayed by a<br />
mine field, and an infantry company or<br />
two swung to the west and rolled down<br />
the main road into the village. The<br />
Sherman tanks on the Recht road were<br />
caught in m<strong>as</strong>ked positions from which<br />
they could not return the panzer fire<br />
coming in from higher ground, and the<br />
troops in Rodt could not stand alone<br />
against the Panthers. The enemy took<br />
the village quickly, and with it many<br />
of the half-tracks belonging to the 48th<br />
Armored Infantry Battalion.<br />
Word that the St. Vith–Vielsalm road<br />
had been cut at Rodt reached Lt. Col.<br />
Vincent L. Boylan, Commanding <strong>Of</strong>ficer,<br />
87th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron,<br />
who took charge of the few troops of<br />
CCB remaining north of St. Vith on the<br />
wide open flank. Boylan got orders from<br />
Clarke to withdraw south at once. De-<br />
spite a brush with Remer’s group and<br />
the loss of several tanks in the swampy<br />
ground south of Rodt the command<br />
reached Crombach and Hinderhausen,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> General Clarke w<strong>as</strong> building a<br />
second line of defense. This line w<strong>as</strong><br />
now gravely endangered on its open<br />
north flank by the German position<br />
<strong>as</strong>tride the ridge at Rodt.<br />
In the meantime, Colonel Rosebaum,<br />
the CCA commander, sent two of his<br />
tank companies e<strong>as</strong>t of Poteau to engage<br />
Remer’s tanks. In a long-distance duel<br />
along the ridge the Shermans were out-<br />
ranged. Rosebaum <strong>as</strong>ked for some tank<br />
destroyers, hoping to stop the Panthers<br />
if they should turn west from Rodt.<br />
Remer’s objective, however, w<strong>as</strong> not in<br />
that direction.<br />
All during the morning of 22 Decem-<br />
ber American observers had watched<br />
enemy troops and vehicles milling<br />
around Recht, just to the north of<br />
Poteau. Here the first identification<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made of the 9th SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sion. This fresh armored division w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
fact moving its main strength west from<br />
Recht toward the Salm River and col-<br />
lision with the 82d Airborne Division,<br />
but a kampfgruppe had been dropped<br />
off to cover the south flank of the divi-<br />
sion by attacking in the direction of<br />
Vielsalm. With the discovery of this new<br />
enemy force in the north and the knowl-<br />
edge that the only route of withdrawal<br />
remaining to CCA w<strong>as</strong> along the road<br />
from Poteau to Vielsalm, Colonel Rose-<br />
baum gave over the effort against<br />
the Fuehrer Begleit armor and gat<strong>here</strong>d<br />
the major part of his command in a<br />
circular defense around the Poteau<br />
crossroads. As yet he had only vague in-<br />
formation of the serious situation con-<br />
fronting the American troops in the<br />
south and southe<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
The capture of Rodt left General<br />
Clarke no alternative but further with-<br />
drawal. In the early afternoon the<br />
sketchy line just west of St. Vith w<strong>as</strong><br />
abandoned and CCB fell back to the<br />
secondary position which had been<br />
under preparation since the early morn-<br />
ing hours. The villages of Hinderhausen<br />
and Crombach, on which this position<br />
w<strong>as</strong> b<strong>as</strong>ed, both offered emergency exits<br />
to the west along dirt roads and trails.<br />
The three t<strong>as</strong>k forces organized along<br />
the new line nominally represented a<br />
total of five medium tank companies, a
410 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
light tank company, three platoons of<br />
90-mm. tank destroyers, two troops of<br />
cavalry, and the equivalent of four or<br />
five rifle companies. But unit integrity<br />
had been lost, the armored components<br />
were far below strength, and many of<br />
the armored infantry were weary, ill-<br />
equipped stragglers who had been put<br />
back in the line after their escape from<br />
St. Vith. General Clarke’s plea for rein-<br />
forcements brought in a rifle company,<br />
a company of tank destroyers, and a few<br />
light armored vehicles. That w<strong>as</strong> all.<br />
Supplies were running short and the<br />
ground now occupied w<strong>as</strong> not well<br />
adapted to defense. Still worse, CCB<br />
had no friendly contact on the north,<br />
and a patrol sent to establish connection<br />
with CCB, 9th Armored, on the south<br />
had disappeared. The fact w<strong>as</strong> that the<br />
62d Volks Grenadier Division had thrust<br />
a force through the woods and along<br />
Braunlauf Creek into the gap between<br />
the two combat commands.<br />
It will be recalled that on the night<br />
of 21 December General Hoge had set<br />
in motion a withdrawal of the northern<br />
flank of CCB, 9th Armored, to conform<br />
with Clarke’s first defensive position just<br />
west of St. Vith. In blinding snow, on<br />
slippery roads, 9th Armored tanks and<br />
infantry headed for Bauvenn, desig-<br />
nated <strong>as</strong> the linkage point for the two<br />
combat commands. Confusion, darkness,<br />
and mud slowed the move, but by morn-<br />
ing a medium tank company and a<br />
platoon of riflemen had reached the vil-<br />
lage.<br />
Bauvenn, no more than a jog in the<br />
road, lay three-quarters of a mile north<br />
of the natural corridor through which<br />
flowed the Braunlauf Creek, the corridor<br />
at whose e<strong>as</strong>tern entrance the enemy<br />
had attacked the night before in sever-<br />
ing the connective tissue between the<br />
7th and 9th Armored combat commands.<br />
The course of the valley westward<br />
proffered a natural line of advance, and<br />
through it, in the early hours of the<br />
22d, pushed small detachments of the<br />
62d Volks Grenadier Division. Unde-<br />
tected, a German rifle company reached<br />
Neubrueck, in the valley southwest of<br />
Bauvenn, w<strong>here</strong> the command post of<br />
the 27th Armored Infantry Battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> located. About 1000 the enemy<br />
rushed the village and killed or captured<br />
the entire battalion staff. A counterat-<br />
tack thrown in by a scratch force of in-<br />
fantry and tanks from Bauvenn drove<br />
the Germans out and freed those Amer-<br />
icans still alive. In a subsequent read-<br />
justment of the CCB line to round out<br />
the goose egg, Hoge’s tanks and infantry<br />
were arrayed from Neubrueck south and<br />
west through Grufflange and Maldingen.<br />
Late in the afternoon a battalion of the<br />
424th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> added to the line,<br />
but <strong>as</strong> yet the enemy made no appear-<br />
ance in force in this sector.<br />
The LXVI Corps w<strong>as</strong> in no position<br />
to capitalize with speed and immediate<br />
effect on its capture of St. Vith. As the<br />
intermingling of roadways at St. Vith<br />
had made it possible for the defenders<br />
to bar the way west, so now this knot<br />
in the Belgian-German road prevented<br />
a quick transfer of men and guns in<br />
pursuit. <strong>Of</strong> the LXVI Corps only those<br />
units which had swung wide of the city<br />
during the attack were able to main-<br />
tain pressure on the Americans: the<br />
Fuehrer Begleit Brigade, executing<br />
its semi-independent turning movement,<br />
and the advance guard of the 190th<br />
Grenadier Regiment, inserting a com-<br />
pany or so between the two CCB’s. In<br />
the course of the night battle at St. Vith
ST. VITH IS LOST 411<br />
the German <strong>as</strong>sault units had become<br />
badly scrambled. The problem involved<br />
in extricating and re-forming these units<br />
w<strong>as</strong> enhanced by the natural desire of<br />
the German soldiers to make the most<br />
of this opportunity to sleep for a little<br />
while in warm billets. Service and army<br />
troops, with and without orders, jammed<br />
into the city in a kind of scavenger hunt<br />
for anything usable that the Americans<br />
had left behind.<br />
The Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, thus far un-<br />
able to win enough roads for a m<strong>as</strong>s<br />
movement to the west, turned its reserve<br />
formations into the roads threading into<br />
the city. The traffic jam thus created<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made worse by the horde of officers<br />
and men driving American vehicles<br />
captured in the Schnee Eifel who were<br />
grimly determined to hang onto their<br />
loot. By midmorning of 22 December<br />
the flood of vehicles streaming into St.<br />
Vith w<strong>as</strong> out of control. For some hours<br />
the columns could move neither forward<br />
nor back, and when Field Marshal Model<br />
arrived on the scene he w<strong>as</strong> forced to<br />
dismount and make his way into the<br />
city on foot. Corps and division military<br />
police, too few in number for a traffic<br />
problem of this magnitude, were brushed<br />
<strong>as</strong>ide. The volks grenadier officers who<br />
tried to restore some semblance of order<br />
found the SS officers of the army units<br />
truculent and unyielding. Divisional<br />
and corps artillery, emplaced with great<br />
effort in the woods e<strong>as</strong>t of the city, now<br />
had to be snaked out along the narrow,<br />
muddy, woods trails and wedged piece<br />
by piece onto the overburdened roads<br />
entering St. Vith. Even the batteries<br />
supporting the 62d Volks Grenadier<br />
Division on the south flank were<br />
brought to a standstill in the mire on the<br />
byp<strong>as</strong>s through Galhausen.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the commander of the 18th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, whose men had<br />
taken St. Vith, the events of 22 De-<br />
cember spelled cat<strong>as</strong>trophe; to the<br />
Americans falling back from the city they<br />
were a godsend. Given this breath-<br />
ing spell, the Allies now faced the ques-<br />
tion of whether the tired, depleted, and<br />
divided forces trying to form a new<br />
perimeter should make a lone and<br />
desperate stand or fall back to join the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps. This decision<br />
rested with Field Marshal Montgomery,<br />
the newly <strong>as</strong>signed commander of all<br />
Allied forces north of the German sali-<br />
ent, who had been authorized by the<br />
Supreme Commander to give up such<br />
ground <strong>as</strong> w<strong>as</strong> necessary in order to <strong>as</strong>-<br />
semble sufficient strength for a decisive<br />
counterattack. During the morning of<br />
the 22d a red-tabbed British captain<br />
arrived at General H<strong>as</strong>brouck’s head-<br />
quarters, introducing himself <strong>as</strong> one of<br />
the field marshal’s liaison officers. Po-<br />
litely he <strong>as</strong>ked H<strong>as</strong>brouck what he<br />
thought should be done with the 7th<br />
Armored. The general answered that the<br />
division naturally would continue to de-<br />
fend if its present position w<strong>as</strong> con-<br />
sidered to be vital but that he personally<br />
favored withdrawal. 5<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck’s answer and a report on<br />
the existing state of the American forces<br />
were taken to Montgomery. Mean-<br />
while H<strong>as</strong>brouck dispatched a memo-<br />
5 Montgomery’s first source of information on the<br />
American situation and, subsequently, his best<br />
liaison agency with the American commanders<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the British intelligence-communications organi-<br />
zation known <strong>as</strong> Phantom. The Phantom officers<br />
were particularly welcome at Hodges’ headquarters<br />
and Collins’ VII Corps headquarters, a partial<br />
explanation of the close tie-in between Montgomery<br />
and these particular commands. See R. J. T. Hills,<br />
Phantom W<strong>as</strong> T<strong>here</strong> (London: Edward Arnold &<br />
Co., 1951).
412 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
randum to the XVIII Airborne Corps<br />
commander setting forth the hard facts<br />
of the c<strong>as</strong>e already put to the British<br />
captain.<br />
. . . Unless <strong>as</strong>sistance is promptly forth-<br />
coming I believe our present position may<br />
become serious for several re<strong>as</strong>ons, namely:<br />
a. Our supplies must come in through a<br />
bottleneck over a bridge near Vielsalm. b.<br />
We may become subjected to enemy artil-<br />
lery fire from practically any direction. c.<br />
The road net within our position is<br />
totally inadequate to the troops and ve-<br />
hicles concentrated t<strong>here</strong>in. The map<br />
shows many roads, but on the ground, the<br />
majority of these are mere tracks on which<br />
even a jeep bogs down if more than two<br />
or three travel on it. d. If the 2d SS Panzer<br />
Division attack should succeed in driving<br />
back the two RCTs of the 82d Airborne<br />
Division now between Salmchâteau and<br />
Hebronval even <strong>as</strong> little <strong>as</strong> 3000 yards we<br />
will be completely severed from any source<br />
of supplies.<br />
Since the chances of <strong>as</strong>sistance in the<br />
immediate future do not seem bright, I<br />
would like to suggest that consideration be<br />
given to withdrawal of the 7th Armored<br />
and 106th Divisions to a position to the<br />
right (west) of the 82d Airborne Division<br />
w<strong>here</strong> they may be of <strong>as</strong>sistance in halting<br />
a possible advance north by the 2d SS<br />
Panzer.<br />
The withdrawal of CCB, 7th Armored<br />
Division, l<strong>as</strong>t night from St. Vith w<strong>as</strong> ex-<br />
pensive. So far we are missing at le<strong>as</strong>t one<br />
half of Clarke’s force. <strong>Of</strong> course many of<br />
them will show up, but they will be minus<br />
weapons, ammunition, blankets and ra-<br />
tions <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> at a low physical level. I<br />
don’t think we can prevent a complete<br />
break-through if another all-out attack<br />
comes against CCB tonight [italics sup-<br />
plied] due largely to the fact that our<br />
original three infantry battalions have at<br />
present melted to the equivalent of only<br />
two very tired battalions.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> about an hour before noon.<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck had not yet sent his message<br />
to Ridgway when word came of the<br />
German advance against the north flank<br />
of CCB, 7th Armored, in the Rodt sector.<br />
General H<strong>as</strong>brouck now had a postscript<br />
to add, one bringing tenseness and<br />
urgency to the precise military form and<br />
phr<strong>as</strong>eology of the main text.<br />
P.S. A strong attack h<strong>as</strong> just developed<br />
against Clarke again. He is being out-<br />
flanked and is retiring west another 2,000<br />
yards refusing both flanks. I am throwing<br />
in my l<strong>as</strong>t chips to halt him. Hoge h<strong>as</strong><br />
just reported an attack. In my opinion if<br />
we don’t get out of <strong>here</strong> and up north of<br />
the 82d before night, we will not have a<br />
7th Armored Division left. RWH.<br />
This message reached Ridgway’s head-<br />
quarters ten minutes before noon.<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck w<strong>as</strong> not alone in this ap-<br />
prehensive view of things to come. Over<br />
the field telephone General Jones con-<br />
curred in the opinion furnished Mont-<br />
gomery and Ridgway, but at 1250 Jones<br />
dispatched a memo to Ridgway saying,<br />
“My intentions are to retain the ground<br />
now defended.” Without further orders<br />
the two commanders, their staffs, and<br />
subordinates set to work on plans for<br />
demolitions and a rear guard stand to<br />
keep the escape routes to the Salm open.<br />
During the afternoon the 7th Armored<br />
Division trains, whose officers and men<br />
had done a remarkable job in support-<br />
ing the troops in the salient, got through<br />
one l<strong>as</strong>t supply column of ninety ve-<br />
hicles to Salmchâteau. The arrival<br />
of g<strong>as</strong>oline, rations, ammunition, and<br />
the presence of a few replacement ve-<br />
hicles in the division park would make<br />
the l<strong>as</strong>t-ditch stand or withdrawal,<br />
whichever it might be, a little e<strong>as</strong>ier.<br />
In the middle of the afternoon the<br />
order came-withdraw. Montgomery had<br />
consulted with General Hodges, the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> commander, and <strong>here</strong>
ST. VITH IS LOST 413<br />
showed the ability to honor the fighting<br />
man which had endeared him to the<br />
hearts of the Desert Rats in North<br />
Africa: “They can come back with all<br />
honor. They come back to the more<br />
secure positions. They put up a wonder-<br />
ful show.” The First <strong>Army</strong> commander,<br />
tired and worried from the strain under<br />
which he had lived since 16 December,<br />
agreed to the withdrawal. 6<br />
In the chain of command only General<br />
Ridgway demurred. He still hoped to<br />
counterattack and restore the line<br />
Malmédy–St. Vith. As an airborne com-<br />
mander thoroughly indoctrinated in the<br />
concept of isolated action by units cut<br />
off from friendly ground contact and<br />
supply he took a sanguine view of the<br />
ability of the goose-egg defenders to hold<br />
until the projected corps counterattack<br />
relieved them. This optimism, <strong>as</strong> the<br />
record shows, w<strong>as</strong> not shared by the<br />
commanders in the ring itself. At 1500<br />
a radio message from the XVIII Air-<br />
borne Corps headquarters informed<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck that the “request of CG, 7<br />
AD” for withdrawal had been approved.<br />
With this concrete mission <strong>as</strong>signed,<br />
planning began for the extremely diffi-<br />
cult job of disengaging from an enemy<br />
who might continue the attack at any<br />
moment. Even <strong>as</strong> a logistical exercise<br />
withdrawal presented a tricky staff prob-<br />
lem. The roads to be used were few<br />
and in poor state, the troops and vehicles<br />
to be moved were so numerous that a<br />
thirty-minute gap in a column on any<br />
6 The role played by Montgomery while in<br />
command on the north flank of the Ardennes is<br />
described in two of his books: Field Marshal<br />
Montgomery of Alamein, Normandy to the Baltic<br />
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1948) and<br />
The Memoirs of Field-Marshal the Viscount<br />
Montgomery of Alamein (Cleveland, Ohio: The<br />
World Publishing Company, 1958). For the numer-<br />
ous visits to General Hodges see the Sylvan Diary.<br />
one of the roads would be serious. The<br />
7th Armored Division, CCB of the 9th<br />
Armored, the remnants of the 106th<br />
Division, and the sizable attached units<br />
all would have to make their westward<br />
exit through a 3,000-yard-wide bottle-<br />
neck with only two bridges, those span-<br />
ning the Salm River at Vielsalm and<br />
Salmchâteau. <strong>To</strong> achieve the tight con-<br />
trol needed in this type of operation<br />
General Ridgway ordered General H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck to take charge of all the troops<br />
in the ring, General Jones becoming<br />
<strong>as</strong>sistant to the corps commander and<br />
General Hoge being named deputy com-<br />
mander of the 7th Armored.<br />
The plan for withdrawal, slowly and<br />
carefully worked out by H<strong>as</strong>brouck and<br />
Colonel Ryan on the evening of the 22d,<br />
envisaged a progressive siphoning from<br />
the units farthest to the e<strong>as</strong>t in which<br />
these troops p<strong>as</strong>sed gradually into the<br />
main routes leading to the bridges while<br />
rear guard forces staged holding actions<br />
in echelon along the roads and trails.<br />
Originally three routes were chosen: a<br />
northern route along the Poteau-Viel-<br />
salm road; a center route from Comman-<br />
ster to the Vielsalm bridge (nothing<br />
more than a poor woods road); and<br />
a southern route via Maldingen, Beho,<br />
and Bovigny, thence north along the<br />
Salm valley road to the Salmchâteau<br />
bridge and e<strong>as</strong>t along the Salmchâteau-<br />
La Roche road by way of the Baraque<br />
de Fraiture crossroads, which at this<br />
time w<strong>as</strong> still in American hands.<br />
General Ridgway estimated that H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck’s troops would have fourteen<br />
hours of darkness in which to make their<br />
getaway. But at le<strong>as</strong>t four hours were<br />
consumed in drafting the plan and dis-<br />
patching liaison officers, who had to<br />
memorize the general plan and the
414 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
specific instructions for the unit to which<br />
they were sent. At 0030 on the 23d<br />
General H<strong>as</strong>brouck informed General<br />
Hoge that his combat command, which<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to initiate the move west, would<br />
begin withdrawal at 0200. By this time<br />
both Hoge’s and Clarke’s combat com-<br />
mands were under attack. The two com-<br />
manders consulted, agreed that Hoge<br />
could not break loose and thus expose<br />
Clarke to encirclement from the rear,<br />
and telephoned H<strong>as</strong>brouck at his com-<br />
mand post in Vielsalm that the with-<br />
drawal must be delayed. Meanwhile the<br />
hours of darkness were slipping away.<br />
The bulk of the LXVI Corps re-<br />
mained wedged in the streets of St. Vith<br />
or backed up along the roads funneling<br />
in from the e<strong>as</strong>t. But the combat eche-<br />
lons of the two regiments of the 62d<br />
Volks Grenadier Division which had by-<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed the city on the south were in posi-<br />
tion by the night of the 22d to renew the<br />
attack. A few tanks, light armed recon-<br />
naissance troops, most of the division<br />
engineers, and considerable rifle strength<br />
struck through the dark against the e<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
ern arc of the loosely organized Ameri-<br />
can ring. At first t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no artillery<br />
forward to give weight to the <strong>as</strong>sault,<br />
but densely wooded approaches and<br />
darkness gave the advantage to the at-<br />
tackers.<br />
At Crombach, in the sector held by<br />
CCB, 7th Armored, the attack came in<br />
along the railroad, and the American<br />
tanks again were blinded by high<br />
velocity flares which gave the first clear<br />
shot to the enemy armor. E<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
village American infantry and engineers<br />
were aided by friendly gunners, for the<br />
434th Armored Field Artillery Battalion<br />
had received some ammunition when the<br />
trains came in and its forward observers<br />
were well posted. A protective barrage<br />
dropped in a half moon, sometimes no<br />
more than three hundred yards in front<br />
of the American foxholes, checked part<br />
of the 190th Grenadier Regiment e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Crombach. But some Germans filtered<br />
into town from the north and started<br />
hunting down the American tanks and<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns. With little protection<br />
against the German bazooka teams a<br />
number of the fighting vehicles pulled<br />
out of danger. Colonel Wemple and<br />
other officers restored a line, but when<br />
daylight came it w<strong>as</strong> hard to tell whether<br />
friend or foe really held Crombach.<br />
The left battalion of the 190th made<br />
use of the predawn hours on the 23d<br />
to renew the push along Braunlauf<br />
Creek (on the north flank of Hoge’s<br />
combat command) , which had been<br />
beaten back by the American tankers<br />
early in the day. This time the enemy<br />
gained Neubrueck and held it, feeding<br />
in more troops hourly from the <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
area of Galhausen. Horse-drawn artillery<br />
succeeded in getting into position near-<br />
by and had a share in the action. The left<br />
flank of CCB, 7th Armored, folded back<br />
to the southwest. Then Hoge’s center<br />
w<strong>as</strong> hit, at this point by the 164th<br />
Grenadier Regiment whose troops got<br />
into Grufflange in the darkness and over-<br />
ran a medium tank platoon. The situa-<br />
tion at Grufflange w<strong>as</strong> so confused that<br />
neither Americans nor Germans reacted<br />
to the fight t<strong>here</strong>, either to seal off the<br />
sector or to continue the penetration.<br />
Meanwhile, <strong>as</strong> dawn drew near, the left<br />
wing of the 164th moved against<br />
Thommen, w<strong>here</strong> a cavalry platoon held<br />
an outpost to the south of the main<br />
CCB, 9th Armored, lines. A heavy bar-<br />
rage (the 62d Volks Grenadier Division<br />
by this time had a number of pieces
ST. VITH IS LOST 415<br />
in firing position) and a m<strong>as</strong>sed infantry<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault drove the troopers out. When<br />
ordered back into the village the cavalry-<br />
men found it jammed with German in-<br />
fantry.<br />
By daylight small hostile groups had<br />
pushed far to the west in the sectors<br />
of the two armored combat commands.<br />
Some had even climbed out of the<br />
Braunlauf valley and engaged in scat-<br />
tering fire against the battalion of the<br />
424th Infantry in the reserve position<br />
at Maldingen. In general, however, the<br />
battle w<strong>as</strong> waning all along the e<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
arc, bringing a brief respite to the men<br />
in the foxholes, now subjected to a<br />
freezing, bl<strong>as</strong>ting wind after hours of<br />
fighting in snow and slush. Although<br />
no major disruption had occurred in the<br />
ring defense, the night attacks had de-<br />
veloped cracks in the line at Crombach<br />
and in the valley of the Braunlauf<br />
which would widen under a little more<br />
pressure. Most important, the 62d Volks<br />
Grenadier Division had robbed the<br />
Americans of their chance for a night<br />
withdrawal.<br />
At Vielsalm General H<strong>as</strong>brouck<br />
waited impatiently for word that the two<br />
har<strong>as</strong>sed combat commands were ready<br />
to disengage. He w<strong>as</strong> acutely conscious<br />
of the narrow margin of protection af-<br />
forded by the 82d Airborne Division and<br />
worried lest a northward attack by the<br />
incoming 2d SS Panzer Division beat<br />
back the west flank of the 82d and<br />
close off the Salm River exits once and<br />
for all. Finally, at 0500, this message<br />
went out from the command post of the<br />
7th Armored Division:<br />
The situation is such on the west of the<br />
river south of [the] 82d that if we don’t<br />
join them soon the opportunity will be<br />
over. It will be necessary to disengage<br />
whether circumstances are favorable or<br />
not if we are [to] carry out any kind of<br />
withdrawal with equipment. Inform me of<br />
your situation at once particularly with re-<br />
gard to possibility of disengagement and<br />
execution of withdrawal.<br />
General Hoge, whose combat com-<br />
mand w<strong>as</strong> first in the march table, w<strong>as</strong><br />
able to give a favorable answer, but<br />
all this l<strong>as</strong>t-minute improvisation took<br />
time. As a result, orders charging CCB,<br />
9th Armored, to pull out at 0600 were<br />
received in Hoge’s command post at<br />
0605. About ten minutes later the with-<br />
drawal commenced, running smoothly<br />
to conclusion. One tank company w<strong>as</strong><br />
left <strong>as</strong> rear guard north of Maldingen,<br />
t<strong>here</strong> blocking the approach from the<br />
German concentration area at Gal-<br />
hausen, but the enemy reacted slowly<br />
and the rear guard got away with the loss<br />
of only two tanks. A small cavalry de-<br />
tachment, T<strong>as</strong>k Force Lindsey (Capt.<br />
Franklin P. Lindsey, Jr.), remained<br />
through the morning, screening the<br />
exit route at its Maldingen entrance.<br />
The first ph<strong>as</strong>e of the withdrawal had<br />
been auspicious. Be it noted, however,<br />
that the southern route (via Beho,<br />
Salmchâteau, and through the 82d Air-<br />
borne lines at Lierneux) followed a<br />
hard-surfaced motor road, that <strong>as</strong> yet<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little traffic congestion, and<br />
that the enemy efforts prior to the with-<br />
drawal had not disorganized the com-<br />
mand but had simply forced its left flank<br />
closer to the avenue of escape.<br />
The southern force of CCB, 7th Ar-<br />
mored, under Colonel Wemple, w<strong>as</strong> next<br />
to go, the plan calling for a move south<br />
through Braunlauf and onto the route<br />
traveled by Hoge’s columns. Wemple’s<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k had been complicated by the events<br />
of the night, since the Germans had
416 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
won partial control of Crombach and<br />
were sitting across the road in the rear<br />
of the American tanks and riflemen to<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t of the village. But the <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns which had pulled out of Crombach<br />
and gone south during the night battle<br />
now came handily into play. At 0718<br />
Wemple sent the guns blazing into the<br />
western side of the village in an attempt<br />
by smoke and shell to drive the Germans<br />
off the streets.<br />
The enemy grenadiers and gunners<br />
refused to stay put. When the American<br />
tanks rolled in from the e<strong>as</strong>t, two of<br />
the leaders were hit by antitank fire<br />
and left helplessly blocking the road.<br />
Fate took a hand to save the rest of<br />
the column. During the night a quick<br />
freeze had hardened the ground just<br />
enough to allow the tanks and half-<br />
tracks from the e<strong>as</strong>t, covered with cling-<br />
ing foot troops, to swing cross-country<br />
and south to the Braunlauf road. Even<br />
so, a number of vehicles mired and had<br />
to be abandoned at the soft banks of<br />
a small stream. At Braunlauf the col-<br />
umn found a company of the 424th<br />
Infantry in a fire fight with German<br />
infantry who had sneaked in during the<br />
night. The tankers, mindful of their<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sengers, could not use the tank can-<br />
non; so the column rolled through the<br />
streets with the infantry riders firing<br />
wildly in every direction. The Germans<br />
were somewhat disconcerted, but snipers<br />
accounted for two American officers. The<br />
rest of the journey behind Hoge’s col-<br />
umns into the 82d Airborne lines w<strong>as</strong><br />
without incident. By noon most of the<br />
424th Infantry and Wemple’s force were<br />
across the Salm. <strong>Of</strong> the southern half<br />
of the original ring t<strong>here</strong> remained only<br />
the rear guard and covering forces strung<br />
along the roads e<strong>as</strong>t of Salmchâteau.<br />
The bulk of CCB, 7th Armored Divi-<br />
sion, represented by T<strong>as</strong>k Force Lohse<br />
(formerly Erlenbusch), commanded by<br />
Maj. Leslie A. Lohse, and T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Boylan, started to withdraw shortly after<br />
daybreak, Boylan’s command acting <strong>as</strong><br />
the division rear guard. Maneuver by<br />
these elements of CCB w<strong>as</strong> rigidly con-<br />
stricted by the presence of the Fuehrer<br />
Begleit armor in the north around Rodt<br />
and by the German hold on Crombach.<br />
Access to the Poteau-Vielsalm route in<br />
the north or the Beho-Salmchâteau<br />
route in the south w<strong>as</strong> no longer possible.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remained a narrow, rutted trail<br />
running from Hinderhausen (around<br />
which T<strong>as</strong>k Force Boylan w<strong>as</strong> deployed)<br />
west through the woods to the crossroads<br />
at Commanster, from which a secondary<br />
road ran to the bridge at Vielsalm. This<br />
jeep trail–it w<strong>as</strong> no more–had been<br />
reconnoitered by General Clarke on the<br />
22d and designated (with much mis-<br />
giving) <strong>as</strong> an emergency exit. The<br />
emergency had arrived, fortunately along<br />
with the sudden freeze that gave a<br />
surface hard enough to bear the weight<br />
of armored vehicles. Even so the one-<br />
way trail w<strong>as</strong> a poor and precarious<br />
road to safety; a sudden thaw or one<br />
tank <strong>as</strong>kew could trap both Lohse and<br />
Boylan.<br />
While Boylan’s men took positions to<br />
defend Hinderhausen against attack<br />
from Rodt, Lohse’s heavy column formed<br />
to enter the trail at Hinderhausen.<br />
It consisted of four tank companies, two<br />
cavalry reconnaissance troops, a com-<br />
pany of tank destroyers, and many foot<br />
soldiers hitchhiking on the vehicles. The<br />
move had no more than started when<br />
the Fuehrer Begleit Brigade descended<br />
on Hinderhausen. While Boylan took on<br />
the Germans, Lohse’s column circled
ST. VITH IS LOST 417<br />
the village, then funneled slowly into the<br />
woods. One tank threw its track on the<br />
one-way stretch but obligingly co<strong>as</strong>ted<br />
off the trail and into the trees. At<br />
Commanster a traffic jam started. Most<br />
of the nine field artillery battalions in<br />
the ring had been grouped in this area<br />
and their displacement–while some bat-<br />
teries remained to keep up fire–w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
slow, painful process. General Clarke<br />
took a hand <strong>here</strong> <strong>as</strong> a kind of super<br />
traffic cop until the jam cleared. By noon<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Lohse and most of the artil-<br />
lery had crossed the river at Vielsalm.<br />
Having cut the St. Vith–Vielsalm road<br />
by capturing Rodt in the late morning<br />
of the 22d, Remer’s Fuehrer Begleit<br />
Brigade made no serious attempt to push<br />
beyond Rodt, either against CCA, 7th<br />
Armored Division, to the west or CCB<br />
to the south. Remer’s heavy Panthers<br />
had made bad going of the muddy roads<br />
north of Rodt. Only a few arrived in<br />
time to take part in the battle t<strong>here</strong>;<br />
for the rest of the day and far into the<br />
night the Panthers crawled into the<br />
Rodt <strong>as</strong>sembly area. The Fuehrer<br />
Begleit trains could not negotiate the<br />
churned and mired trails at all. They<br />
would have to be threaded through the<br />
St. Vith bottleneck.<br />
In the early morning of 23 December<br />
Remer gat<strong>here</strong>d a truck-mounted bat-<br />
talion of armored infantry, put some<br />
tanks at their head, and started them<br />
for Hinderhausen, with the intention of<br />
cutting south across the rear of the<br />
Americans. About 0800 the Panthers en-<br />
gaged the small covering force at<br />
Hinderhausen. A brace of 90-mm. tank<br />
destroyers knocked out two of the lead<br />
tanks, temporarily halting the attack<br />
and giving Lohse’s column time to reach<br />
Commanster. When the Germans finally<br />
maneuvered into position to renew the<br />
attack, the Americans broke free and<br />
fell back toward Commanster. German<br />
infantry and a few tanks pursued but<br />
were held off until the l<strong>as</strong>t of the CCB<br />
column had been pushed through the<br />
village and w<strong>as</strong> on its way northwest<br />
to the Vielsalm bridge.<br />
Colonel Boylan led the rear guard<br />
back toward the bridge but then w<strong>as</strong><br />
ordered, because of a traffic jam at the<br />
bridge, to hold on the e<strong>as</strong>t bank until<br />
the 7th Armored Division headquarters<br />
could cross. This covering force con-<br />
sisted of a few light tanks, a couple of<br />
tank destroyers and a few rifle squads<br />
from the 112th Infantry. The Fuehrer<br />
Begleit Brigade did not follow CCB.<br />
Remer’s orders were to join the LVIII<br />
Panzer Corps west of the Salm, and his<br />
immediate design w<strong>as</strong> to reach the paved<br />
road leading to Salmchâteau. The motor-<br />
ized rifle battalion, now led by an <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault gun company, headed south toward<br />
the road center at Beho, found it free<br />
of American troops, and t<strong>here</strong> joined a<br />
part of the 62d Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion. The time now w<strong>as</strong> midafternoon.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Lindsey, whose cavalry<br />
and infantry had screened the main with-<br />
drawal of the southern segment of the<br />
ring, had come under damaging shell-<br />
fire <strong>as</strong> the 62d Volks Grenadier Division<br />
artillery got into position. About 13 15<br />
the t<strong>as</strong>k force fell back through Beho<br />
and proceeded west to Salmchâteau,<br />
picking up other small blocking groups<br />
<strong>as</strong> it went. Thus far events in the<br />
southern sector had gone well for the<br />
Americans. T<strong>here</strong> remained the t<strong>as</strong>k of<br />
evacuating the blocking force which for<br />
so long had held the southernmost out-<br />
posts of the St. Vith salient. This w<strong>as</strong><br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jones, <strong>as</strong>sembling in the
418 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
middle of the afternoon at Bovigny some<br />
three and a half miles south of Salm-<br />
château on the west side of the Salm<br />
River. <strong>To</strong> protect the valley corridor<br />
through which T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jones would<br />
have to move some companies of the<br />
112th Infantry were still left e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
river in the villages of Rogery and<br />
Cierreux.<br />
When CCB of the 9th Armored, the<br />
424th Infantry, and the larger part of<br />
CCB, 7th Armored, had peeled away in<br />
layers from the ring, the l<strong>as</strong>t two combat<br />
commands of the 7th Armored defend-<br />
ing the Poteau-Vielsalm highway had<br />
to be drawn off. At Poteau, five miles<br />
from the river, CCA stood facing the<br />
enemy to north, e<strong>as</strong>t, and south. CCR<br />
maintained its cordon along the valley<br />
road. The Americans did not know that<br />
the troops of the 9th SS Panzer Division,<br />
who in p<strong>as</strong>t days had made raids from<br />
Recht southwest toward Poteau, were<br />
few in number and that only the day<br />
before the main body of the 9th SS<br />
Panzer Division had started on a forced<br />
march to the northwest in an attempt<br />
to break through to Kampfgruppe<br />
Peiper, now nearing the end of its tether.<br />
The German force left at Recht w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
more than a screen, although under<br />
orders to maintain pressure on Poteau.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the e<strong>as</strong>t of CCA, 7th Armored<br />
Division, however, some part of the 293d<br />
Regiment of the 18th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division finally had worked its way<br />
through St. Vith, arriving during the<br />
night of 22 December at Rodt. After<br />
some confusion in getting through the<br />
Fuehrer Begleit Brigade around Rodt<br />
on the morning of 23 December, the<br />
293d continued along the road to Po-<br />
teau. Again a confused command situa-<br />
tion took its price. The infantry and<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns in the 9th SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sion screen mistook the newcomers for a<br />
withdrawing American column and<br />
poured in heavy flanking fire. It w<strong>as</strong><br />
some hours later–and the Americans<br />
had decamped–when the 293d finally<br />
entered Poteau.<br />
Poteau lends itself well to defensive<br />
action. It stands at the entrance to the<br />
valley road which leads to Vielsalm, and<br />
mechanized attack from either Recht or<br />
Rodt had to funnel through the narrow<br />
neck at this crossroads, vehicle maneuver<br />
off either of the two approaches being<br />
almost impossible. Away from the cross-<br />
roads the ground rises sharply and is<br />
cluttered with thick stands of timber.<br />
The formation adopted by CCA w<strong>as</strong><br />
b<strong>as</strong>ed on a semicircle of ten medium<br />
tanks fronting from northwest to e<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
backed by tank destroyers and with rifle-<br />
men in a foxhole line well to the front.<br />
About 1035 the blocking troops left by<br />
the 9th SS Panzer Division made an<br />
attack. Tank and artillery fire stopped<br />
the Germans just <strong>as</strong> it had on previous<br />
days. Perhaps the enemy would have<br />
returned to the fray and made the final<br />
withdrawal hazardous, but shortly after<br />
noon some P–38’s of the 370th Fighter<br />
Group, unable to make contact with the<br />
82d Airborne Division control to which<br />
they were <strong>as</strong>signed, went to work for<br />
the 7th Armored Division, bombing<br />
and strafing along the road to Recht.<br />
The enemy recovery w<strong>as</strong> slow.<br />
At 1345 H<strong>as</strong>brouck sent the signal for<br />
CCA to pull out. In an hour the armored<br />
infantry were out of their holes and<br />
their half-tracks were clanking down the<br />
road to Vielsalm. Forty minutes later<br />
the tanks left Poteau, moving f<strong>as</strong>t and<br />
exchanging shots with German tanks,<br />
while the 275th Armored Field Artillery
ST. VITH IS LOST<br />
fired a few final salvos to discourage<br />
pursuit. When the l<strong>as</strong>t vehicle of CCA<br />
roared over the Vielsalm bridge (at 1620)<br />
the remaining artillery followed; then<br />
came the little force from CCR which<br />
had held the road open while CCA made<br />
its withdrawal. Darkness descended over<br />
the Salm valley <strong>as</strong> CCR sped across the<br />
Vielsalm bridge.<br />
The vacuum which had existed for<br />
some hours in the northern reaches of<br />
the one-time ring had filled rapidly in<br />
the late afternoon <strong>as</strong> the 18th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division brought its infantry<br />
out of St. Vith. Through most of the<br />
23d, confusion and immobility char-<br />
acterized the St. Vith bottleneck. But<br />
the process of disentangling this m<strong>as</strong>s<br />
of men and vehicles w<strong>as</strong> speeded up<br />
considerably during the afternoon when<br />
the 402d and 485th Squadrons (370th<br />
Fighter Group) winged their bombs<br />
onto the city and its approaches. By<br />
dark the 293d Regiment w<strong>as</strong> march-<br />
ing through Poteau and the rest of the<br />
infantry formations of the division were<br />
jumbled along a five-mile front on the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t side of the Salm. Control, <strong>as</strong> the<br />
18th’s commander later reported, w<strong>as</strong><br />
almost nonexistent. As a result the small<br />
body of riflemen from the 112th Infantry<br />
and Boylan’s tiny armored rear guard<br />
were able to see the headquarters of the<br />
7th Armored safely across the Vielsalm<br />
bridge and to withdraw themselves<br />
through that city without much inter-<br />
ference from the enemy closing along<br />
the river. This w<strong>as</strong> sometime after 1900.<br />
Although troops of the 18th Volizs<br />
Grenadier Division or the 9th SS Panzer<br />
Division fired on Boylan <strong>as</strong> his detach-<br />
ment reached the river, they made no<br />
attempt to rush the bridge–a fortunate<br />
circumstance, <strong>as</strong> it turned out, for when<br />
419<br />
the 82d Airborne engineers tried to blow<br />
the bridge the charge failed to explode.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> after midnight when the engineers<br />
finally reported that the charge had been<br />
replaced and successfully detonated. 7<br />
Even then the span w<strong>as</strong> only partially<br />
wrecked and w<strong>as</strong> still capable of bearing<br />
foot troops; but the German tanks mill-<br />
ing about the burning buildings e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
the river would have to find other means<br />
of crossing the Salm.<br />
As for the l<strong>as</strong>t American troops extri-<br />
cated from the ring, T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jones,<br />
it will be recalled, had <strong>as</strong>sembled at<br />
Bovigny, south of Salmchâteau and on<br />
the west bank of the river, while ele-<br />
ments of the 112th Infantry waited e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the river at Rogery and Cierreux for<br />
the withdrawal order from General H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck. The Germans driving on Salm-<br />
château were held in tighter control<br />
than those advancing toward Vielsalm<br />
and moved with greater speed and co-<br />
ordination. Around 1500 the mobile col-<br />
umn of the Fuehrer Begleit Brigade<br />
appeared in front of Rogery. T<strong>here</strong> two<br />
companies of the 1st Battalion, 112th<br />
Infantry, were deployed, guarding a<br />
draw and secondary road which provided<br />
quick access to the Salm valley at a<br />
point midway between Jones’s <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
area at Bovigny and Salmchâteau. Lack-<br />
ing armored or other antitank means,<br />
the American infantry fell back in some<br />
confusion through the draw to Cierreux,<br />
less than a half-mile e<strong>as</strong>t of the river.<br />
General H<strong>as</strong>brouck w<strong>as</strong> apprised of this<br />
new enemy threat; by what he later<br />
remembered <strong>as</strong> “one of the funniest<br />
7 1st Lt. George D. Lamm of the 508th Parachute<br />
Infantry led a series of charges to hold back the<br />
Germans while the bridge w<strong>as</strong> being prepared<br />
for demolition; t<strong>here</strong>after he braved the enemy<br />
fire to detonate the explosives himself. He w<strong>as</strong><br />
given the DSC.
420 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
orders I ever issued,” the 7th Armored<br />
commander sent his “division reserve”<br />
-two tank destroyers–hurrying south<br />
from Vielsalm. One of the tank destroy-<br />
ers arrived just <strong>as</strong> a German tank pla-<br />
toon hove into sight at Cierreux, hit the<br />
two leaders, and drove off the five re-<br />
maining tanks. During the lull that<br />
followed, a platoon of light cavalry tanks<br />
and a section of towed tank destroyers<br />
came e<strong>as</strong>t from the river road to give a<br />
hand.<br />
Colonel Nelson, commanding the<br />
112th Infantry, had sent a radio message<br />
some time around 1300 telling H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck that the withdrawal e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
river had been completed, that only the<br />
112th covering force remained. Nelson<br />
waited for three hours for the division<br />
order to withdraw (a liaison officer with<br />
such an order had left H<strong>as</strong>brouck’s com-<br />
mand post at 1345) . Then, with German<br />
tanks only two hundred yards from the<br />
regimental command post, lacking any<br />
communication with the 7th Armored<br />
headquarters, and out of touch with what<br />
w<strong>as</strong> happening elsew<strong>here</strong>, he gave the<br />
word to pull out of Salmchâteau. By<br />
this time T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jones w<strong>as</strong> moving<br />
along the Bovigny-Salmchâteau road<br />
which traversed the narrow defile cut<br />
by the Salm River. The infantry, con-<br />
siderably disorganized, had just crossed<br />
the river west of Cierreux and started<br />
feeding into the 2,500-yard-long column<br />
on the valley road when word p<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
down the line that the light tanks in<br />
the van had been hit by enemy fire <strong>as</strong><br />
they entered Salmchâteau. Here w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
column, strait-jacketed on the valley floor<br />
by high ridges to either side, unable to<br />
move forward or back, and with the<br />
enemy apparently closing in from every<br />
side. But Colonel Nelson, his executive<br />
officer, Col. William F. Train, and a few<br />
other officers set to work to organize a<br />
breakout.<br />
Actually the column w<strong>as</strong> blocked at<br />
Salmchâteau before the pursuing troops<br />
of the Fuehrer Begleit Brigade caught<br />
up with the tail. This bridgehead village<br />
lay in the outpost line of the 508th<br />
Parachute Infantry. Just north, the wing<br />
of the 82d Airborne defense running<br />
west to the Baraque de Fraiture cross-<br />
roads (and junction with the 3d Ar-<br />
mored Division) rested on the Salm<br />
River. In the late afternoon of the 23d<br />
the single company of the 112th Infantry<br />
at the e<strong>as</strong>tern end of the SaIm River<br />
bridge had been attacked by a larger<br />
force from the 62d Volks Grenadier<br />
Division. The Americans had blown the<br />
bridge and fallen back through Salm-<br />
château to the lines of the 82d, w<strong>here</strong>-<br />
upon a few of the Germans crossed the<br />
river and entered the village. The<br />
stopper w<strong>as</strong> more firmly seated in the<br />
bottleneck just at dark with the arrival<br />
of a detachment from the 2d SS Panzer<br />
Division coming in from the southwest.<br />
While the 2d SS Panzer Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awaiting the g<strong>as</strong>oline needed for<br />
its projected attack north along the<br />
seam between the 82d Airborne Di-<br />
vision and the 3d Armored in the Bara-<br />
que de Fraiture sector, the reinforced<br />
Reconnaissance Battalion (Maj. Ernst<br />
Krag) had been dispatched on the 22d<br />
to cut the main road between Salm-<br />
château and the Baraque de Fraiture<br />
crossroads. Krag’s detachment attacked<br />
straight north, driving in the American<br />
outposts in villages south of the road<br />
and dropping off small parties en route<br />
to form blocking positions covering the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern flank of the division advance.<br />
An attack to seize the village of Jou-
ST. VITH IS LOST 421<br />
biéval, on the main road, w<strong>as</strong> launched<br />
late in the day but w<strong>as</strong> repulsed by<br />
the American artillery.<br />
Krag decided to shift his advance to-<br />
ward Salmchâteau and t<strong>here</strong> possibly<br />
link up with friendly forces he knew<br />
to be coming from St. Vith. He had<br />
available nearly three reconnaissance<br />
troops and an <strong>as</strong>sault gun battalion.<br />
His accompanying battalion of self-pro-<br />
pelled artillery w<strong>as</strong> within range of<br />
Salmchâteau. A sharp attack in the<br />
late afternoon brought Krag’s detach-<br />
ment through the American outposts<br />
in the hamlets west of Salmchâteau,<br />
and by nightfall he had a troop in the<br />
south section of the town, its t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
made e<strong>as</strong>ier by the preliminary shell-<br />
ing laid in by the battalion of field<br />
guns. From this point on Kampfgrup-<br />
pe Krag fought two battles, one to<br />
mop up the town, the other to capture<br />
American vehicles trying to break out<br />
of the valley road in the south.<br />
As the evening wore on, the leading<br />
Americans bottled up in the defile<br />
h<strong>as</strong>tily organized an attack to open the<br />
exit through Salmchâteau, but t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> little room to deploy, and this at-<br />
tempt failed. At the tail of the column<br />
dis<strong>as</strong>ter, in the form of the Fuehrer<br />
Begleit advance guard, suddenly struck.<br />
The light tanks and tank destroyers,<br />
earlier disposed at Cierreux, and now<br />
brought back to form the column rear<br />
guard, were spotted by German scouts<br />
and set upon in the dark by <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns that lighted their targets with<br />
high velocity flares. Several of the<br />
American fighting vehicles were de-<br />
stroyed before they could return fire.<br />
<strong>To</strong> make matters worse some engineers<br />
blew a culvert, trapping the tail of<br />
the column. In sharp fighting most of<br />
the mechanized force at the tail w<strong>as</strong><br />
destroyed.<br />
This w<strong>as</strong> not to be the end. A trail<br />
had been discovered leading west out<br />
of the valley, and most of the middle<br />
of the column, led by a light tank<br />
company, escaped over it. Fortunately<br />
bright moonlight allowed some maneu-<br />
ver. Striking northwest and fighting<br />
off the small blocking forces left be-<br />
hind by Kampfgruppe Krag, the bulk<br />
of this part of the column succeeded<br />
in reaching the 82d Airborne. By mid-<br />
night on the 23d over two hundred<br />
men from the column had reached the<br />
508th Parachute Infantry and many<br />
others straggled in before daylight.<br />
How many vehicles and men were cap-<br />
tured by the enemy is impossible to<br />
say.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is a postscript to this story.<br />
During T<strong>as</strong>k Force Jones’s disengage-<br />
ment the 440th Armored Field Artil-<br />
lery had emplaced to give covering fire<br />
and protect the flank of the t<strong>as</strong>k force.<br />
When the 440th commenced its with-<br />
drawal word came in that the Germans<br />
had blocked the designated crossing<br />
site at Salmchâteau. T<strong>here</strong>upon the<br />
440th formed in column, cut loose with<br />
every available machine gun, knifed<br />
through the startled enemy, and roared<br />
over the bridge at Vielsalm.<br />
The troops under General H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck’s command who came back across<br />
the Salm River were greeted by a<br />
warm letter of commendation from the<br />
Supreme Commander and orders to<br />
return at once to the fight. It is<br />
difficult to determine with surety how<br />
much of the 7th Armored Division,<br />
CCB, 9th Armored, 424th Infantry,<br />
112th Infantry, and the numerous at-<br />
tached’ units had been lost during the
422 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
fight for St. Vith and in the subsequent<br />
withdrawal. Many records were de-<br />
stroyed during the final retreat, units<br />
were put back in the line on the 23d<br />
with no accounting of their existing<br />
strength, and the formations of the 106th<br />
Division and 14th Cavalry Group had<br />
taken very severe losses before the de-<br />
fense of St. Vith began. C<strong>as</strong>ualty figures<br />
subsequently compiled for the 7th Ar-<br />
mored Division, and the 14th Cavalry<br />
Group list 3,397 officers and men either<br />
killed, wounded, or missing, Statistics<br />
on losses suffered by the various artil-<br />
lery, engineer, and tank destroyer units<br />
have never been compiled. The 7th Ar-<br />
mored Division (by fairly accurate reck-<br />
oning) had lost 59 medium tanks, 29<br />
light tanks, and 25 armored cars. 8<br />
8 Ridgway w<strong>as</strong> told that t<strong>here</strong> were about one<br />
The losses sustained by the defend-<br />
ers of St. Vith must be me<strong>as</strong>ured<br />
against their accomplishments. They had<br />
met an entire German corps flushed<br />
with e<strong>as</strong>y victory and halted it in its<br />
tracks. They had firmly choked one of<br />
the main enemy lines of communica-<br />
tion and forced days of delay on the<br />
westward movement of troops, guns,<br />
tanks, and supplies belonging to two<br />
German armies. They had given the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps badly needed<br />
time to gather for a co-ordinated<br />
and effective defense. Finally, these<br />
units had carried out a successful with-<br />
drawal under the most difficult condi-<br />
tions and would return again to do<br />
battle.<br />
hundred usable tanks in the forces which came<br />
out of St. Vith. Cf. XXIII below, pp. 582–83.
CHAPTER XVIII<br />
The VII Corps Moves <strong>To</strong> Blunt the Salient<br />
Thus far the story of the German<br />
counteroffensive h<strong>as</strong> been developed on<br />
a geographical pattern generally from<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t to west with particular attention<br />
given the initial battles fought by the<br />
American forces attempting to hold the<br />
shoulders of the salient, the defense of<br />
St. Vith, the VIII Corps’ attempt to<br />
form a barrier line across the area of<br />
penetration, and the First <strong>Army</strong>’s efforts<br />
to extend the north flank alongside the<br />
expanding bulge. While these bitter de-<br />
fensive battles were being waged, Amer-<br />
ican forces were already moving to go<br />
over to the offensive in the south,<br />
for <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> 19 December General<br />
Eisenhower and his field commanders<br />
had laid plans for a major counterat-<br />
tack. But before this counterattack, by<br />
the Third <strong>Army</strong>, takes stage center,<br />
three important developments are un-<br />
folding: the division of the Ardennes<br />
battlefield between Field Marshal Mont-<br />
gomery and General Bradley, the <strong>as</strong>sem-<br />
bly and intervention of the VII Corps<br />
in an extension of the American north<br />
shoulder, and the initial defense of the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne sector. 1<br />
Division of the Battlefield<br />
Late on Tuesday evening, 19 De-<br />
cember, Maj. Gen. Kenneth w. D.<br />
Strong, the SHAEF chief of intelligence,<br />
1 This l<strong>as</strong>t will be the subject of the next<br />
chapter.<br />
went to Maj. Gen. J. F. M. Whiteley,<br />
deputy chief of staff for operations at<br />
SHAEF, with a proposal which would<br />
have very audible repercussion. The<br />
German drive, said Strong, showed no<br />
sign of turning northwest toward Liège<br />
but seemed to be developing on a<br />
thrust line directly to the west. This<br />
meant, in his opinion, that the Ameri-<br />
can forces north and south of the grow-<br />
ing salient would be split by its further<br />
expansion toward the Meuse. It w<strong>as</strong> his<br />
idea, t<strong>here</strong>fore, that two commands<br />
should be created to replace General<br />
Bradley’s 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group control of<br />
the divisive battle front, General Brad-<br />
ley to retain command of the troops on<br />
the southern shoulder of the salient,<br />
Field Marshal Montgomery to take<br />
those in the north under the wing of<br />
the British 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group. Strong’s<br />
proposal seemed sound to Whiteley.<br />
Although both officers were British,<br />
neither had broached this idea to the<br />
field marshal.<br />
Whiteley immediately took his col-<br />
league in to see the SHAEF chief of<br />
staff, Lt. Gen. Walter Bedell Smith.<br />
General Smith, famous in the head-<br />
quarters for his hair-trigger temper, first<br />
reacted negatively and with considerable<br />
heat, then cooled off and admitted the<br />
logic of the proposal. Sometime that<br />
same evening Smith telephoned Brad-<br />
ley. Bradley w<strong>as</strong> none too sympathetic<br />
toward the idea but did concede that
424 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Montgomery would be more apt to<br />
throw British reserves into the battle<br />
under such a command arrangement.<br />
The next morning Smith brought up the<br />
matter in the Supreme Commander's<br />
usual meeting with his staff. Eisenhower<br />
in his turn telephoned Bradley, who<br />
agreed to the division of command.<br />
The new army group boundary line,<br />
now ordered by Eisenhower, would ex-<br />
tend from Givet, on the Meuse, to St.<br />
Vith. (That both these locations would<br />
be Montgomery's responsibility w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
clarified until nearly twenty-four hours<br />
later.) The reorganization placed the<br />
U.S. First and Ninth Armies under<br />
Montgomery's 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group. Bradley<br />
would command all forces to the south<br />
of the salient–which in effect meant<br />
Patton's Third <strong>Army</strong>–and eventually he<br />
might add Devers’ 6th <strong>Army</strong> Group.<br />
The reorganization required a like shift<br />
in the Allied air forces, meaning that<br />
the U.S. IX and XXIX Tactical Air<br />
Commands (Maj. Gen. Elwood R.<br />
Quesada and Maj. Gen. Richard E.<br />
Nugent) were put under the operation-<br />
al control of the British Second Tac-<br />
tical Air Force commanded by Air Chief<br />
Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham. Be-<br />
cause the British had very strong forces<br />
of fighter-bombers, enough of these<br />
planes were taken from IX Tactical<br />
Air Command to give Brig. Gen. Otto<br />
P. Weyland's XIX Tactical Air Com-<br />
mand, slated to support Patton's coun-<br />
terattack into the German bulge, ten<br />
fighter-bomber groups. 2<br />
2 Daily notes kept by the Chief of the Air Staff,<br />
SHAEF, Air Marshal James M. Robb on the meet-<br />
ings held in the Supreme Commander's office,<br />
SHAEF (Main), in OCMH files (<strong>here</strong>after cited<br />
<strong>as</strong> Robb Notes) ; SHAEF (Main) files: Montgomery<br />
to Eisenhower.<br />
The decision to p<strong>as</strong>s the U.S. First<br />
and Ninth Armies to British command<br />
must have been hard to make, since<br />
both Eisenhower and Smith were acute-<br />
ly conscious of the smoldering animos-<br />
ity toward the British in general and<br />
Montgomery in particular which exist-<br />
ed in the headquarters of the 12th<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group and Third <strong>Army</strong>, not to<br />
mention the chronic anti-British senti-<br />
ment which might be anticipated from<br />
some circles in W<strong>as</strong>hington. 3 This de-<br />
cision involved no question of Bradley's<br />
ability <strong>as</strong> a commander–that had been<br />
abundantly proven–but rather w<strong>as</strong> a rec-<br />
ognition of the communications prob-<br />
lem presented by the German thrust<br />
between Bradley’s headquarters in Lux-<br />
embourg City and Hodges’ headquar-<br />
ters, which had been moved on the 19th<br />
from Spa to Chaudfontaine.<br />
Face-to-face discussion between Brad-<br />
ley and Hodges–let alone Simpson–so<br />
needful if the army group commander<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to give the continuous encourage-<br />
ment and counsel demanded in these<br />
trying days, w<strong>as</strong> already difficult. If<br />
German raiders crossed the Meuse, it<br />
might become impossible. Bradley had<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t visited Hodges in the early evening<br />
of the 17th by motoring directly from<br />
Paris. Further visits would involve tra-<br />
versing three sides of a square: west<br />
from Luxembourg across the Meuse<br />
(and perhaps <strong>as</strong> far west <strong>as</strong> Reims),<br />
north into Belgium, then e<strong>as</strong>t again be-<br />
hind the none too certain American<br />
front. Telephone and radio contact still<br />
existed; indeed, Bradley talked half a<br />
dozen times on the 18th with Hodges<br />
and General Kean, the First <strong>Army</strong> chief<br />
of staff, and at le<strong>as</strong>t twice on the 20th.<br />
3 Pogue, The Supreme Command, pp. 378–80<br />
and n.; Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 355.
THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT 425<br />
CAR BEARING GENERAL BRADLEY FORDS A BELGIAN RIVER<br />
But this w<strong>as</strong> hardly a satisfactory substi-<br />
tute for personal presence.<br />
The 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group had approx-<br />
imately fifty important wire circuits<br />
on 16 December between Luxembourg<br />
and First and Ninth Armies, these ex-<br />
tending laterally to link the three head-<br />
quarters in sequence. The mainstay<br />
and trunk line of this system w<strong>as</strong> a com-<br />
bination open-wire and buried cable<br />
line from Aubange, near Luxembourg,<br />
via Jemelle to Namur and Liège. Jem-<br />
elle w<strong>as</strong> a repeater station (near Mar-<br />
che) and the key to the whole northern<br />
network. As it turned out the Germans<br />
subsequently cut both the wire line and<br />
cable; the signal operators, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong><br />
a rifle platoon and a few light tanks<br />
on guard duty at Jemelle, were or-<br />
dered out when the enemy w<strong>as</strong> in sight<br />
of the station. Very high frequency radio<br />
stations seem to have been available<br />
throughout the battle but transmission<br />
did not carry very far and had to be<br />
relayed. These stations twice had to be<br />
moved farther west to avoid capture.<br />
Nonetheless the Signal Corps would<br />
succeed in maintaining a minimum<br />
service, except for short interruptions,<br />
by stringing wire back into France and<br />
through the various army rear are<strong>as</strong>.<br />
Whether this would have sufficed for the<br />
12th <strong>Army</strong> Group to exercise adminis-<br />
trative <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> tactical control of the<br />
First and Ninth Armies from Luxem-<br />
bourg is problematical.
426 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
A British major presented himself at<br />
the First <strong>Army</strong> headquarters about two-<br />
thirty on the morning of the 20th. Ush-<br />
ered up to Hodges’ bedroom he told<br />
the general and Kean that Montgomery<br />
w<strong>as</strong> moving 30 British Corps (Lt. Gen.<br />
B.G. Horrocks) south into the H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
selt–Louvain–St. Trond area to back<br />
up the Meuse line if needed, that four<br />
divisions were on the way and a fifth<br />
would follow. Further, he said, the Brit-<br />
ish were taking over the responsibility<br />
for the Meuse bridges at Namur,<br />
Liège, Huy, and Givet. One of Hodges’<br />
main worries could now be shouldered<br />
by somebody else. Whether t<strong>here</strong> would<br />
be a sufficient force available to halt<br />
the German drive if it reached the<br />
Meuse River south of Givet w<strong>as</strong> still<br />
open to question.<br />
News of the decision to split the Amer-<br />
ican forces battling in the Bulge came<br />
to the First <strong>Army</strong> later in the morning<br />
when Bradley telephoned this word.<br />
Montgomery himself arrived at Hodges’<br />
command post an hour or so after noon,<br />
commencing a series of daily visits. He<br />
promptly agreed with Hodges that the<br />
V Corps’ position jamming the German<br />
northern shoulder would have to be<br />
held at any cost and concurred in the<br />
handling of the XVIII Airborne Corps<br />
<strong>as</strong> it had been deployed in the p<strong>as</strong>t<br />
thirty-six hours. Eisenhower’s formal or-<br />
GENERAL COLLINS, FIELD MARSHAL MONTGOMERY, AND GENERAL RIDGWAY, after<br />
a conference at VII Corps headquarters.
THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT 427<br />
der placing the First and Ninth Armies<br />
under Montgomery’s command stressed<br />
that the flanks of the penetration must<br />
be held but added that all available<br />
reserves should be gat<strong>here</strong>d to start<br />
counterattacks in force. Montgomery’s<br />
problem, then, w<strong>as</strong> to cover the west<br />
flank of the First <strong>Army</strong> between the<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps and the Meuse<br />
while re-forming his new command for<br />
the counterattack mission. It would<br />
appear that at this juncture the field<br />
marshal w<strong>as</strong> thinking in terms of a<br />
counterattack against the western tip<br />
of the salient, for he told Hodges that<br />
he wanted the most aggressive Ameri-<br />
can corps commander who could be<br />
found and sufficient troops to launch an<br />
attack from the area southwest of the<br />
XVIII Airborne.<br />
As to the first item, the marshal made<br />
his wishes very clear: he wanted Maj.<br />
Gen. J. Lawton Collins (“Lightning<br />
Joe”), whose VII Corps had been car-<br />
rying the left wing of the December<br />
Roer River offensive; nor would he lis-<br />
ten to any other names. W<strong>here</strong> to find<br />
the divisions needed w<strong>as</strong> more difficult.<br />
But Bradley already had ordered the<br />
84th Infantry Division to leave the<br />
Ninth <strong>Army</strong> and come in on Ridgway’s<br />
flank, the 75th Infantry Division had<br />
just arrived from the United States and<br />
would reach the battle zone in a few<br />
days, the 3d Armored Division might<br />
be available in the proximate future.<br />
This, then, w<strong>as</strong> the line-up for the new<br />
VII Corps when Collins reported to<br />
Hodges in the early morning of the 21st.<br />
Collins got the promise of an addition<br />
to his putative force when Brig. David<br />
Belchem, 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group chief of opera-<br />
tions, who w<strong>as</strong> visiting headquarters,<br />
suggested that the 2d Armored Division<br />
be taken from the Ninth <strong>Army</strong> reserve.<br />
Collins, who considered the veteran, 2d<br />
and 3d the best armored divisions in<br />
the U.S. <strong>Army</strong>, accepted with enthusi-<br />
<strong>as</strong>m. Later in the day Montgomery<br />
met with Hodges and Simpson, confirm-<br />
ing the proposed transfer of the 2d Ar-<br />
mored from Simpson’s command.<br />
The VII Corps Assembles<br />
Along the Roer River front the Ninth<br />
<strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> being stripped progressively<br />
of its reserves <strong>as</strong> the German threat<br />
in the south incre<strong>as</strong>ed. After the 7th Ar-<br />
mored and 30th Infantry Divisions had<br />
been rushed to the First <strong>Army</strong> on 17<br />
December, the next to go would be<br />
the 84th Infantry Division (Brig. Gen.<br />
Alexander R. Bolling), taken out of<br />
the Geilenkirchen sector. Bolling re-<br />
ceived orders on the night of the 19th<br />
to make ready for relief by the 102d<br />
Infantry Division, and at noon the next<br />
day his leading regimental combat team,<br />
the 334th, w<strong>as</strong> on the road to Belgium.<br />
At Chaudfontaine the First <strong>Army</strong> G–3<br />
told Bolling to <strong>as</strong>semble the 84th in the<br />
Marche sector, but the First <strong>Army</strong> staff<br />
could furnish little accurate information<br />
<strong>as</strong> to the location of friendly or enemy<br />
troops in that area. Temporarily at-<br />
tached to the XVIII Airborne Corps,<br />
Bolling had no knowledge of the embryo<br />
attack plan for the VII Corps. He w<strong>as</strong><br />
alerted, however, to be ready to attack<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t or e<strong>as</strong>t on order. 4<br />
4 Both the VII Corps and the 84th Division<br />
prepared AAR’s and G–3 journals. The regiments<br />
of the 84th also have AAR’s and unit journals.<br />
The semiofficial history of the latter division w<strong>as</strong><br />
prepared by a member of the division, Lt. Theo-<br />
dore Draper, The 84th Infantry Division in the<br />
Battle of Germany, November 1944–May 1945<br />
(New York: The Viking Press, 1946). See also
428 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Two hours before midnight on 20<br />
December the leading troops of the 84th<br />
entered Marche. The remainder of the<br />
division w<strong>as</strong> coming out of the line<br />
about the same time, ready to begin the<br />
seventy-five-mile move from Germany to<br />
Belgium. As it stood it would be some<br />
twenty-four hours before Bolling could<br />
be sure of having the entire division<br />
in hand. The 84th had been blooded on<br />
the West Wall fortifications in the<br />
Geilenkirchen sector and had spent a<br />
month in combat before the move south.<br />
Battalions had been rotated in the front<br />
lines and were less battle-weary than<br />
many of the troops thrown into the<br />
Ardennes, but losses had been heavy and<br />
the division w<strong>as</strong> short 1,278 men.<br />
The area in which the 84th Division<br />
(and the VII Corps) would <strong>as</strong>semble<br />
w<strong>as</strong> high and rolling. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
well-defined system of ridges but in-<br />
stead a series of broad plateaus separat-<br />
ed by deep-cut valleys. Although some<br />
sections were heavily forested, in gen-<br />
eral the countryside w<strong>as</strong> given over to<br />
farm and p<strong>as</strong>ture land dotted with small<br />
wood lots. Concealment w<strong>as</strong> possible in<br />
the narrow stream valley and the larger<br />
forests. The sector in question w<strong>as</strong><br />
bounded on the e<strong>as</strong>t by the Ourthe<br />
River, a natural barrier of considerable<br />
significance. At a right angle to the<br />
Ourthe another and less difficult river<br />
line composed of the Lesse and its tribu-<br />
tary, L’Homme, ran south of Marche,<br />
through Rochefort, and into the Meuse<br />
near Dinant. Beyond Marche a plateau<br />
Cpl. Perry S. Wolff, A <strong>History</strong> of the 334th In-<br />
fantry (Mannheim, Germany: Mannheimer Gross-<br />
druckerei, 1945). The tank battalion supporting<br />
the 84th also h<strong>as</strong> published its combat record:<br />
Capt. E. C<strong>as</strong>tagna, The <strong>History</strong> of the 771st Tank<br />
Battalion (Berkeley, Calif.: Lederer, Street & Zeus<br />
Co., Inc., 1946).<br />
suffused with the upland marshes and<br />
bogs so common to the Ardennes ex-<br />
tended <strong>as</strong> far south <strong>as</strong> St. Hubert. Marche<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the central and controlling road<br />
junction for the entire area between the<br />
middle Ourthe and the Meuse. Here<br />
crossed two extremely important paved<br />
highways; that running south from<br />
Liège to Sedan; and N4, the Lux-<br />
embourg City–Namur road which ran<br />
diagonally from B<strong>as</strong>togne northwest to<br />
Namur and the Meuse with an offshoot<br />
to Dinant. Eight miles south and west<br />
of Marche the Liège-Sedan highway<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed through the town of Rochefort, at<br />
which point secondary but hard-surfaced<br />
roads broke away to the west, north,<br />
and southwest. Rochefort, by road, w<strong>as</strong><br />
approximately twenty miles from Din-<br />
ant and the Meuse. Marche w<strong>as</strong> some<br />
twenty-eight miles from B<strong>as</strong>togne and<br />
about the same distance from the<br />
confluence of the Sambre and Meuse<br />
at Namur. The entire area w<strong>as</strong> rich in<br />
all-weather primary and secondary roads.<br />
(Map VIII)<br />
In the small, dark hours of 21 De-<br />
cember while the leading regimental<br />
team of the 84th Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
outposting Marche and bedding down<br />
in the town, the advance guard of the<br />
crack 2d Panzer Division bivouacked on<br />
the west bank of the Ourthe only fifteen<br />
miles away. Neither of these future<br />
antagonists had knowledge of the other.<br />
At this point in the battle, the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> had taken the lead from<br />
the Sixth, whose hell-for-leather Peiper<br />
had run his tanks into a net on the north<br />
flank. Two armored divisions from the<br />
Fifth were driving for the gap which<br />
German reconnaissance had found open<br />
between the XVIII Airborne Corps and<br />
the VIII Corps. In the north the 116th
THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT 429<br />
Panzer Division had righted itself, after<br />
the countermarch ordered on the night<br />
of 19 December, and had pushed the<br />
attack over Samrée on the 20th. The<br />
order for the following day w<strong>as</strong> to cross<br />
the Ourthe in the neighborhood of Hot-<br />
ton, just northe<strong>as</strong>t of Marche, before the<br />
Americans could bring troops into the<br />
area, and thus open the road straight to<br />
the Meuse. The 116th Panzer had lost at<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t twenty-four hours by the counter-<br />
march on the 19th, for on that night its<br />
armored cars had been <strong>as</strong> far west <strong>as</strong> the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne-Marche road. In the neigh-<br />
boring corps to the south, the 2d Panzer<br />
Division finally had taken Noville on the<br />
20th and been ordered to head for<br />
Namur, disregarding the fight which had<br />
flared up from B<strong>as</strong>togne. When its re-<br />
connaissance battalion seized the Ourthe<br />
bridge at Ortheuville, shortly after mid-<br />
night, the road to Marche and Namur<br />
opened invitingly. Luettwitz, the XL VII<br />
Panzer Corps commander, ordered Lau-<br />
chert to disengage the 2d Panzer Divi-<br />
sion north of B<strong>as</strong>togne and speed for the<br />
Meuse.<br />
Here, then, were two armored divi-<br />
sions from two different corps striking<br />
out for the Meuse, one in the possession<br />
of a crossing on the Ourthe, one ex-<br />
pecting to seize a crossing in only a<br />
few hours, but both divisions with their<br />
flanks uncovered and both uncomfort-<br />
ably aware of the fact. Nonetheless the<br />
two corps commanders expected to<br />
thicken their armored thrusts within<br />
twenty-four hours: Luettwitz w<strong>as</strong> trying<br />
to shake the Panzer Lehr loose south<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne; Krueger had been promised<br />
that the 2d SS Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong> on<br />
its way to the LVIII Panzer Corps.<br />
During the 21st, however, the Fifth Pan-<br />
zer <strong>Army</strong>’s advance would be carried<br />
only by forward patrols of the 2d Pan-<br />
zer Division and the 116th, the two<br />
spearhead formations separated by the<br />
Ourthe River and, in ensuing days, fight-<br />
ing distinctly separate battles. 5<br />
The commander of the 84th Infantry<br />
Division set up his command post in<br />
Marche on the late afternoon of 21 De-<br />
cember under order to <strong>as</strong>semble his<br />
division in this area. The enemy, so far<br />
<strong>as</strong> he knew, w<strong>as</strong> some miles away. The<br />
only friendly troops he found in the<br />
neighborhood were those of the 51st En-<br />
gineer Combat Battalion, whose com-<br />
mand post w<strong>as</strong> located in Marche. This<br />
battalion w<strong>as</strong> part of the small engineer<br />
force which the VIII Corps had gath-<br />
ered to construct the barrier line along<br />
the Ourthe River. The engineer com-<br />
mander, Colonel Fr<strong>as</strong>er, spread out his<br />
two companies at roadblocks and dem-<br />
olition sites all the way from Hotton,<br />
on the river, to a point just south of<br />
the Champlon crossroads on the B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne-Marche highway. This latter road-<br />
block w<strong>as</strong> only three miles north of the<br />
Ortheuville bridge, which the 2d Panzer<br />
advance guard wrested from the detach-<br />
ment of the 158th- Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion during the night of 20 De-<br />
cember.<br />
A few German patrols probed at the<br />
roadblock before dawn but no attempt<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made to break through. The Ger-<br />
man reconnaissance troops bedded down<br />
in Tenneville, and batteries of the<br />
division flak rolled into position to<br />
guard the new bridgehead. For some<br />
hours this w<strong>as</strong> all. Lauchert’s tanks<br />
were waiting for g<strong>as</strong>oline and literally<br />
could not move. Although the 2d Panzer<br />
had captured enough American trucks,<br />
5 OB WEST KTB, daily entries for this period.
430 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
jeeps, and half-tracks to motorize both<br />
of its bicycle battalions, the grenadiers<br />
would have to start the march west on<br />
foot for the same re<strong>as</strong>on. Furthermore,<br />
fatigue had begun to tell; the 2d Panzer<br />
troops had been marching and fighting<br />
almost without respite since 16 De-<br />
cember. Some of the human grit w<strong>as</strong><br />
beginning to slow the wheels of the mili-<br />
tary machine. But why Lauchert, a ruth-<br />
less and driving commander, did not<br />
prod his reconnaissance and flak for-<br />
ward on the morning of the 21st can<br />
only be surmised.<br />
The first word of an attacking enemy<br />
reached the 84th Division command<br />
post in Marche at 0900, but the attack<br />
w<strong>as</strong> being made at Hotton, to the north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, w<strong>here</strong> the 116th Panzer Division<br />
had thrown in an <strong>as</strong>sault detachment<br />
to seize the Ourthe Bridge. General<br />
Bolling ordered his single RCT, the<br />
334th under Lt. Col. Charles E. Hoy,<br />
to establish a perimeter defense around<br />
Marche. Meanwhile the 5 1st Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion <strong>as</strong>ked for help in<br />
the Hotton fight. But when troops of<br />
the 334th reached the scene in midaf-<br />
HOTTON, SHOWING KNOCED-OUT GERMAN TANK
THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT 431<br />
ternoon, the embattled engineers, aided<br />
by a few men from the 3d Armored<br />
Division, had halted the enemy and<br />
saved the bridge–a feat of arms subse-<br />
quently acknowledged by the German<br />
corps and army commanders.<br />
About noon Bolling received word<br />
from the XVIII Airborne Corps that<br />
the 334th w<strong>as</strong> to hold the enemy south<br />
of the Hotton-Marche line, both these<br />
villages to be the responsibility of his<br />
division. A few minutes later a corps<br />
message arrived saying that fifteen Ger-<br />
man tanks and an infantry company<br />
had been reported five miles southe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Marche in the hamlet of Bande<br />
and that they were heading west. By<br />
this time General Bolling had a more<br />
precise statement of his mission, for he<br />
had telephoned army headquarters<br />
about eleven o’clock to report the enemy<br />
blow at Hotton and to <strong>as</strong>k whether his<br />
single RCT should be committed to bat-<br />
tle on the Marche-Hotton line. The an-<br />
swer w<strong>as</strong> “Yes, hold.” The question<br />
posed by the commander of the 84th<br />
had been much in the minds of Hodges<br />
and Collins that morning. With the<br />
German armored spearheads breaking<br />
out toward the west, the risk entailed<br />
in <strong>as</strong>sembling the VII Corps piecemeal<br />
<strong>as</strong> far forward <strong>as</strong> Marche w<strong>as</strong> very real,<br />
and the American commanders consid-<br />
ered that perhaps the corps concentra-<br />
tion should be made farther back to the<br />
north. But with the order given Bolling<br />
the die w<strong>as</strong> c<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remained the question of how<br />
best to bring in the rest of the 84th<br />
and the bulk of the corps. Collins <strong>as</strong>ked<br />
for CCR of the 5th Armored Division,<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> at Rötgen under V Corps,<br />
to be detailed to help the 3d Armored<br />
hold N4, the road from Namur.<br />
V Corps, however, still w<strong>as</strong> hard beset<br />
and Hodges would not at this moment<br />
cut into its reserve. The commander of<br />
the 84th, who did not know that a 3d<br />
Armored picket still held Hotton, or-<br />
dered the rest of his division to come<br />
in on a road farther to the west. By<br />
midnight of the 21st, he had his en-<br />
tire division and the attached 771st<br />
Tank Battalion <strong>as</strong>sembled and in proc-<br />
ess of deploying on a line of defense.<br />
About dark, <strong>as</strong> the second RCT de-<br />
trucked, Bolling relieved the 334th of its<br />
close-in defense of Marche and moved<br />
the 2d and 3d Battalions out to form<br />
the left flank of the division, this an-<br />
chored at Hotton w<strong>here</strong> troops of the<br />
3d Armored finally had been met. The<br />
335th (Col. Hugh C. Parker) deployed<br />
to the right of the 334th with its right<br />
flank on N4 and its line circling south<br />
and e<strong>as</strong>t through Jamodenne and Waha.<br />
The 333d (Col. Timothy A. Pedley,<br />
Jr.), l<strong>as</strong>t to arrive, <strong>as</strong>sembled north of<br />
Marche in the villages of Baillonville<br />
and Moresée ready to act <strong>as</strong> cover for<br />
the open right flank of the division–and<br />
army–or <strong>as</strong> the division reserve.<br />
During the night the regiments<br />
pushed out a combat outpost line,<br />
digging in on the frozen ground some<br />
thousand yards forward of the main<br />
position, which extended from Hogne<br />
on Highway N4 through Marloie and<br />
along the pine-crested ridges southwest<br />
of Hampteau. The division now w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
position forward of the Hotton-Marche<br />
road and that vital link appeared secure.<br />
Earlier in the day the 51st Engineer<br />
roadblocks on the Marche-B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
highway had held long enough to allow<br />
the 7th Armored trains to escape from<br />
La Roche and reach Marche, but at<br />
1930 the tiny engineer detachments were
432<br />
given orders to blow their demolition<br />
charges and fall back to Marche, leaving<br />
the road to B<strong>as</strong>togne in German hands.<br />
The main t<strong>as</strong>k confronting the 84th<br />
Division <strong>as</strong> day dawned on the 22d w<strong>as</strong><br />
to determine the location of the enemy.<br />
All through the day armored cars, light<br />
tanks, and infantry in jeeps and trucks<br />
probed cautiously along highways and<br />
byways e<strong>as</strong>t, south, and west. Some of<br />
these vehicles were shot up and the<br />
men came back on foot; others engaged<br />
in brief duels with unseen foes hidden<br />
in villages and wood lots. No German<br />
prisoners were taken, but it w<strong>as</strong> clear<br />
that the enemy also w<strong>as</strong> feeling<br />
his way. At noon an order from the<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps instructed Bol-<br />
ling to block all roads e<strong>as</strong>t, southe<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
and south of Rochefort (seven and one-<br />
half miles from Marche) until the 3d<br />
Armored could extend its flank to this<br />
area. A rifle company w<strong>as</strong> loaded into<br />
trucks and reached Rochefort in the<br />
late afternoon without trouble.<br />
Shortly after issuing this order Ridg-<br />
way extended the mission of the 84th.<br />
Earlier General Collins had visited the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> to express his concern that<br />
the enemy might crowd in south and<br />
west of Marche, thus interdicting the<br />
planned VII Corps concentration. Ridg-<br />
way’s order t<strong>here</strong>fore called for the 84th<br />
to extend a counterreconnaissance<br />
84TH DIVISION MP’s CHECKING VEHICLES AT TRAFFIC CIRCLE near Marche.
THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT 433<br />
screen along the line Harsin-Grupont-<br />
Wellin, some ten miles south of Marche,<br />
at the same time sending security forces<br />
southwest to hold the vital crossroad<br />
villages at Rochefort, Wanlin, and<br />
Beauraing, the latter nearly twenty<br />
miles from the division command post<br />
at Marche. It will be recalled, <strong>as</strong> well,<br />
that Ridgway had ordered the newly<br />
arrived CCA of the 3d Armored Divi-<br />
sion to throw out a screen on the west<br />
bank of the Ourthe between La Roche<br />
and St. Hubert <strong>as</strong> further protection<br />
for the VII Corps <strong>as</strong>sembly. At noon<br />
a t<strong>as</strong>k force from CCA w<strong>as</strong> on<br />
its way but by dark had progressed only<br />
a short distance south of Marche. T<strong>here</strong><br />
it halted on word that the 335th In-<br />
fantry might need help against tanks<br />
seen moving north toward Marche. Part<br />
of the t<strong>as</strong>k force became involved with<br />
enemy armored vehicles near Hargi-<br />
mont and in a short, sharp fight ac-<br />
counted for five of them.<br />
Bolling could free two rifle battalions<br />
and the necessary motors for what he<br />
regarded <strong>as</strong> the first-priority t<strong>as</strong>ks.<br />
Early in the evening the two battalion<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k forces, augmented with tanks and<br />
tank destroyers, started out. The 1st Bat-<br />
talion of the 333d (Lt. Col. Norman<br />
D. Carnes) had orders to secure Wan-<br />
lin and bar the Neufchâteau road to<br />
Dinant on the Meuse; the 3d Battalion<br />
of the 335th (Maj. Gordon A. Bahe)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to hold Rochefort and cover the<br />
road thence to Marche with detach-<br />
ments at Harsin, Hargimont, and Jem-<br />
elle, the important repeater station.<br />
The t<strong>as</strong>k force from the 333d tried the<br />
Rochefort road to Wanlin but ran into<br />
the enemy near Marloie and had to de-<br />
tour back through Marche and round-<br />
about through Haversin, reaching Wan-<br />
lin at daybreak. The battalion of<br />
the 335th bumped into Germans at the<br />
same spot, left an infantry company to<br />
engage the enemy, then swung back<br />
through Marche and Humain, arriving<br />
at Rochefort in the early morning to<br />
find its own I Company in the town<br />
and no sign of the Germans.<br />
Although the enemy obviously w<strong>as</strong><br />
in front of the 84th Infantry Division<br />
in some strength and had shown signs<br />
of incre<strong>as</strong>ing his forces during the 22d,<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sembly of the VII Corps w<strong>as</strong><br />
moving rapidly. Having turned over his<br />
old sector at Duren and its divisions to<br />
the XIX Corps, General Collins and<br />
some of the corps troops moved during<br />
the day into the new VII Corps area<br />
southwest of Liège. <strong>Of</strong> the divisions<br />
promised Collins the 84th w<strong>as</strong> in the<br />
line, the “Hell on Wheels” 2d Armored<br />
Division closed to the rear in the area<br />
before midnight, <strong>as</strong> did the new<br />
75th Infantry Division. The 3d Ar-<br />
mored, of course, w<strong>as</strong> still bitterly<br />
engaged <strong>as</strong> the right wing of the neigh-<br />
boring XVIII Airborne Corps. General<br />
Collins and his staff could feel at home<br />
in this new sector, for the VII Corps had<br />
driven the German forces out of the<br />
area during the first two weeks of Sep-<br />
tember. Furthermore Collins had visited<br />
Bolling’s command post and w<strong>as</strong> con-<br />
vinced that the 84th had matters well<br />
in hand.<br />
The First <strong>Army</strong> commander’s deep<br />
concern for his open western flank-<br />
a concern shared by Collins—w<strong>as</strong> very<br />
considerably relieved on the 22d when<br />
Field Marshal Montgomery arrived at<br />
his headquarters with the welcome news<br />
that the British 29th Armored Brigade,<br />
equipped with fifty tanks, had taken<br />
over the defense of the Namur, Dinant,
434 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
and Givet bridges, and would move on<br />
the morrow to reconnoiter the west<br />
flank of the VII Corps <strong>as</strong>sembly area. 6<br />
Because another twenty-four hours<br />
would be needed to deploy Collins’ divi-<br />
sions and get the corps artillery into<br />
position, Montgomery and Hodges<br />
agreed that the VII Corps counterattack<br />
on which so much depended would<br />
commence on Sunday, the 24th. The<br />
new corps front (officially <strong>as</strong>sumed by<br />
the VII Corps at 1630 on 23 December)<br />
would reach from the Ourthe River on<br />
the left to the junction of the Lesse<br />
and Meuse on the right, approximately<br />
fifty miles. The 2d Armored Division<br />
(Maj. Gen. Ernest N. Harmon) w<strong>as</strong> in-<br />
tended to flesh out the right wing of the<br />
corps when the attack began, the 84th<br />
already held the center, and the 3d Ar-<br />
mored Division w<strong>as</strong> expected to fight<br />
its way farther south and become the<br />
left wing. Since the 75th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong> yet untried, it w<strong>as</strong> to be<br />
kept in reserve.<br />
The 2d Armored Division had small<br />
patrols scouting to the west of Marche<br />
on the 23d, but the bulk of the divi-<br />
sion <strong>as</strong>sembled in three combat com-<br />
mands well to the north of Marche<br />
<strong>as</strong>tride the main road to Huy. Its 70-<br />
mile road march (some units moved<br />
nearly a hundred miles) had been com-<br />
pleted in twenty-two hours despite a<br />
cold rain, hazardous roads, and the de-<br />
lay normal to armored movement in<br />
column at night. All told the division<br />
had suffered some thirty damaged ve-<br />
hicles in traffic mishaps, including eight<br />
tanks. (Later one officer wryly remarked,<br />
“We lost more vehicles on the march<br />
down <strong>here</strong> than in the subsequent<br />
fighting. ”)<br />
6 Sylvan Diary, appropriate daily entries.<br />
The 2d Armored <strong>as</strong>sembly had been<br />
handled with all possible secrecy and<br />
the entire division w<strong>as</strong> under radio<br />
blackout, for Collins counted heavily on<br />
the combination of surprise and shock in<br />
the forthcoming counterattack. Events,<br />
however, were racing on to shatter the<br />
hope that the VII Corps would be al-<br />
lowed to mount a planned and co-ordi-<br />
nated <strong>as</strong>sault. Harmon w<strong>as</strong> conferring<br />
with his commanders an hour or so be-<br />
fore noon on the 23d, when a message<br />
arrived that one of the armored cars out<br />
on patrol had been shot up at a little<br />
hamlet near Ciney, which w<strong>as</strong> a criti-<br />
cal road center northwest of Marche<br />
from which main highways debouched<br />
for Dinant and Namur. Without<br />
waiting for orders, Harmon dispatched<br />
CCA (Brig. Gen. John Collier) to rush<br />
full speed for Ciney and cut off any<br />
German tanks found t<strong>here</strong>. This proved<br />
to be a false alarm; British armored pa-<br />
trols were in the town and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
no sign of the enemy.<br />
By now, however, reports of large en-<br />
emy forces moving toward Ciney were<br />
pouring into the corps and division<br />
command posts. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no longer<br />
any point in trying to hide the iden-<br />
tity of the 2d Armored and it appeared<br />
certain that battle would have to be<br />
given without regard to the planned<br />
corps counterattack. Harmon started his<br />
whole division moving into line west<br />
of the 84th, displaced the 14th and<br />
92d Field Artillery Battalions to sup-<br />
port CCA, and ordered Collier to con-<br />
tinue south on the Ciney-Rochefort<br />
road to seize Buissonville, w<strong>here</strong> twenty<br />
heavy German tanks had been reported.<br />
CCA clanked through the darkness, led<br />
by a t<strong>as</strong>k force composed of the 2d Battal-<br />
ion, 66th Armored Regiment, and the
THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT 435<br />
2d Battalion, 41st Armored Infantry<br />
Regiment. About 2100 the combat com-<br />
mand became involved in a scrambling<br />
skirmish with some Germans who had<br />
dismounted from half-tracks in the vil-<br />
lage of Leignon, wheeled a few small<br />
guns into position covering the road, and<br />
were now able to halt the Americans<br />
for some little time. By midnight Col-<br />
lier’s advance guard of armored infantry<br />
w<strong>as</strong> again on the move but this time<br />
with a more ambitious mission. The<br />
sortie toward Ciney had become a full-<br />
scale attack to aid the hard-pressed 84th<br />
Infantry Division and relieve those of its<br />
units cut off in Buissonville and Roche-<br />
fort. 7<br />
German Armor Advances<br />
on the VII Corps<br />
When the advance guards of the 2d<br />
Panzer Division seized the bridge over<br />
the southern arm of the Ourthe at Or-<br />
theuville on the 21st, they stood only six-<br />
teen miles by road from Marche and less<br />
than forty from Dinant and the Meuse.<br />
It is difficult to determine whether the<br />
2d Panzer Division and Manteuffel’s<br />
Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> were abre<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
German attack schedule or behind it.<br />
Certainly Manteuffel w<strong>as</strong> two or three<br />
days behind the optimistic predictions<br />
generated in Hitler’s headquarters, but<br />
7 The sources for the history of the 2d Armored<br />
are about <strong>as</strong> informative and complete <strong>as</strong> is the<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e with the average armored division. The<br />
AAR’s compiled by the combat commands contain<br />
the bulk of the story. The diary maintained by the<br />
division artillery commander, Col. Carl I. Hutton,<br />
h<strong>as</strong> been made available to the author. Formal<br />
publications of value are: A <strong>History</strong> of the Second<br />
United States Armored Division, 1940–1946<br />
(Atlanta: Albert Love Enterprises, 1946), and<br />
<strong>History</strong>, 67th Armored Regiment (Burnswick,<br />
Germany: Georg Westermann, 1945).<br />
on the other hand few of the lower field<br />
commands had committed themselves to<br />
any fixed march calendar. As of the 21st<br />
t<strong>here</strong> is no evidence in the German<br />
accounts of any pressing concern about<br />
the rate at which the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
attack w<strong>as</strong> proceeding. After all, Sepp<br />
Dietrich’s much-touted Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> had bogged down, the Fifth w<strong>as</strong><br />
well out in front, and German intelli-<br />
gence saw no viable American forces bar-<br />
ring the door to the Meuse that had<br />
opened between B<strong>as</strong>togne and the main<br />
valley of the Ourthe.<br />
Manteuffel still had a few problems to<br />
solve before he could make the final<br />
sprint for the Meuse River in force. Fuel<br />
deliveries for his tanks were flagging, his<br />
divisions had been fighting day and<br />
night since 16 December, a part of his<br />
left armored corps w<strong>as</strong> hung up at B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne, and his armored corps on the right<br />
had been forced to retrace its steps with<br />
some appreciable loss in time. Manteuf-<br />
fel’s first order, sent to the commander<br />
of the XLVII Panzer Corps, w<strong>as</strong> to get<br />
the Panzer Lehr out of the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
battle. With the 2d Panzer Division, now<br />
free of involvement in the army center,<br />
and with the Panzer Lehr and the 116th<br />
Panzer Divisions coming up on the left<br />
and right, respectively, Manteuffel would<br />
have the armor needed for a full-blooded<br />
blow northwest to the Meuse, and<br />
Dinant. The day of the 22d p<strong>as</strong>sed, how-<br />
ever, with little activity on the part of<br />
the 2d Panzer and with little more than<br />
regrouping by Panzer Lehr, which fi-<br />
nally had to start the march with part of<br />
the division still engaged in the fight for<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
By the morning of the 23d these two<br />
divisions were on the move, but their<br />
component parts were widely spaced and
436 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
strung out over long miles of road. The<br />
German troops who hit the 84th Divi-<br />
sion outposts and patrols during the day-<br />
light hours and whose appearance west<br />
of Marche brought the 2d Armored Divi-<br />
sion precipitately into action constituted<br />
little more than a screen for the main<br />
body of the XLVII Panzer Corps. By the<br />
late afternoon, however, the advance<br />
guards of the 2d Panzer and Panzer Lehr<br />
had come up to the forward screen and<br />
were ready for attack. So far only the<br />
84th Division had been identified <strong>as</strong><br />
being in the way. The 2d Panzer Divi-<br />
sion, its first objective Marche, had the<br />
shortest road to follow but w<strong>as</strong> delayed<br />
for several hours by the demolitions at<br />
the crossroads west of Champlon touched<br />
off by the detachment of the 51st En-<br />
gineers. Not until early afternoon did the<br />
leading battalion of the 304th Panzer<br />
Grenadier Regiment overrun the 4th<br />
Cavalry Group outpost at Harsin, and it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> dark when this battalion fought its<br />
way into Hargimont, t<strong>here</strong> severing the<br />
road from Marche to Rochefort.<br />
Inexplicably the forward momentum<br />
of the 2d Panzer main column ce<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
early in the evening. When Luettwitz,<br />
the corps commander, hurried into<br />
Hargimont, he found that the attack had<br />
been halted for the night because Amer-<br />
ican tanks were reported north of the<br />
village. Stopping briefly to tongue-l<strong>as</strong>h<br />
and relieve the colonel in command,<br />
Luettwitz put in a fresh <strong>as</strong>sault detach-<br />
ment which pushed west <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Buis-<br />
sonville and t<strong>here</strong> bivouacked. The<br />
appearance of this force w<strong>as</strong> responsible<br />
for the reports reaching American head-<br />
quarters shortly before midnight that<br />
Company E of the 333d had been<br />
trapped in Buissonville.<br />
Chief protagonist of the advance on<br />
the VII Corps thus far chronicled h<strong>as</strong><br />
been the main column of the 2d Panzer<br />
Division, which on the night of 23 De-<br />
cember had its head at Buissonville and<br />
its body snarled in a long traffic jam on<br />
the single road through Hargimont,<br />
Harsin, and Bande. But German ar-<br />
mored cars, tanks, and motorized infan-<br />
try detachments had been encountered<br />
west and southwest of Marche all during<br />
the day. These troops belonged to the<br />
2d Panzer reconnaissance battalion that<br />
during the night w<strong>as</strong> attempting to re-<br />
<strong>as</strong>semble <strong>as</strong> a homogeneous striking force<br />
west of Buissonville <strong>as</strong>tride the road to<br />
Dinant. It w<strong>as</strong> the point of this battalion<br />
which Collier’s armored infantry en-<br />
countered at Leignon.<br />
Under the new orders to attack toward<br />
Rochefort, CCA had driven a few miles<br />
south of Leignon when Capt. George E.<br />
Bonney, riding at the head of the<br />
column in a jeep, heard the sound of<br />
motors on the road ahead. Bonney<br />
whirled his jeep and rode back along the<br />
column of American half-tracks, p<strong>as</strong>sing<br />
the word to pull off the road and let the<br />
approaching vehicles through. When the<br />
small German column w<strong>as</strong> securely im-<br />
pounded, the Americans cut loose with<br />
the .30-caliber machine guns on the half-<br />
tracks, killing thirty of the enemy and<br />
capturing a like number. Bonney had<br />
his leg almost cut off by slugs from one<br />
of his own tanks farther back in the col-<br />
umn. Since the night w<strong>as</strong> far spent, the<br />
enemy strength and location were un-<br />
certain, and his command had few if any<br />
detailed maps, Collier ordered the CCA<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k forces to reorganize and to laager<br />
until dawn. The leading t<strong>as</strong>k force by<br />
this time w<strong>as</strong> near the village of Haid,<br />
eight miles from Rochefort.<br />
On the day before (23 December),
THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT 437<br />
the Panzer Lehr had been brought for-<br />
ward on the left wing of the 2d Panzer<br />
Division, General Manteuffel himself<br />
leading the march from St. Hubert. The<br />
immediate objective w<strong>as</strong> the road center<br />
at Rochefort, for this town, like Marche,<br />
had to be secure in German hands if a<br />
major <strong>as</strong>sault with all its impedimenta<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to be launched on the roads leading<br />
to Dinant. German gunners had shelled<br />
the town in the late afternoon without<br />
any return fire, and just at dark, scouts<br />
came back from Rochefort to report that<br />
the town w<strong>as</strong> empty. Apparently the<br />
scouts had not entered Rochefort. If they<br />
had, they would have learned that the<br />
84th Division had built up a garrison<br />
t<strong>here</strong> during the p<strong>as</strong>t twenty,-four hours.<br />
In fact the Rochefort defense under<br />
Major Bahe consisted of the 3d Battal-<br />
ion (minus Company L) of the 335th;<br />
a platoon each from the 638th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion, 309th Engineer<br />
Combat Battalion, and 29th Infantry;<br />
plus two platoons of the regimental anti-<br />
tank company.<br />
The approach to Rochefort by the St.<br />
Hubert road lay along a narrow defile<br />
between two hills. Perhaps General Bay-<br />
erlein’s military intuition told him that<br />
the town w<strong>as</strong> defended and that the<br />
ground and the darkness presented some<br />
hazard, for he gave the order, “Also los,<br />
Augen zu, und hinein!” (“OK, let’s go!<br />
Shut your eyes and go in!”) The leading<br />
battalion of the 902d rushed forward,<br />
only to be hit by cross fire from the hills<br />
and stopped cold by a formidable barri-<br />
cade on the road. The Germans took<br />
heavy c<strong>as</strong>ualties. Bayerlein then set to<br />
work in systematic f<strong>as</strong>hion to take Roche-<br />
fort. He brought forward his guns to<br />
pound the hills and the town, and<br />
edged his troops in close <strong>as</strong> the night<br />
lengthened. He did not forget his main<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k, however, and sent a part of the<br />
902d around Rochefort to find a way<br />
across L’Homme River, which looped<br />
the town on the north. These troops<br />
found one bridge intact, giving the<br />
Panzer Lehr access to the Dinant road.<br />
During the night Manteuffel and<br />
Luettwitz discussed the plan to seize<br />
Dinant. They altered the axis of the 2d<br />
Panzer attack to conform with the actual<br />
tactical situation, struck Marche from<br />
the operations map <strong>as</strong> an immediate<br />
goal, and instructed Lauchert’s armor to<br />
byp<strong>as</strong>s it on the southwest. Rochefort, it<br />
appeared, would have to be taken, but<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> intended that the Panzer Lehr<br />
would reinforce its bridgehead force<br />
promptly and get the attack rolling to-<br />
ward Dinant while battering down the<br />
Rochefort defense. Luettwitz, a bold and<br />
experienced corps commander, w<strong>as</strong> anx-<br />
ious to push on for the Meuse but<br />
worried about his flanks. Marche w<strong>as</strong> an<br />
obvious sally port through which the<br />
Americans could pour onto the exposed<br />
flank of the 2d Panzer Division unless<br />
something w<strong>as</strong> done to cut the road<br />
north of the town and thus interdict re-<br />
inforcement. This t<strong>as</strong>k had been <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
the 116th Panzer Division, whose main<br />
strength w<strong>as</strong> still separated from Luett-<br />
witz’ divisions by the Ourthe River.<br />
Promising that the 116th would come<br />
forward to cover the 2d Panzer flank,<br />
Manteuffel set out by automobile to<br />
give the 116th a little ginger.<br />
The army group commander, Model,<br />
had said that the 9th Panzer Division<br />
would support the 2d Panzer on 24 De-<br />
cember, but neither Manteuffel nor<br />
Luettwitz seems to have counted on its<br />
appearance. While commanding the 2d<br />
Panzer Division in Normandy Luettwitz
438<br />
had learned the hard way about the reli-<br />
ability of flank protection promised by<br />
others. He had already begun to strip<br />
troops from both of his forward divisions<br />
for deployment on the shoulders of the<br />
thrust being readied for Dinant. The<br />
Panzer Lehr had most of one regiment<br />
(the 903d) , <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> its antiaircraft and<br />
engineer battalions, strung all the way<br />
from Moircy (west of B<strong>as</strong>togne) to the<br />
area southwest of Rochefort <strong>as</strong> cover on<br />
the left for the division attack corridor.<br />
Bayerlein had been forced to leave one<br />
regiment in the B<strong>as</strong>togne battle; so his<br />
effective <strong>as</strong>sault force on the 24th con-<br />
sisted of the division reconnaissance bat-<br />
talion, some corps and division artillery,<br />
and one reinforced regiment. All of the<br />
2d Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong> available to<br />
Lauchert, but the kampfgruppen of the<br />
division were widely separated and for<br />
every mile forward troops would have to<br />
be dropped off to cover the division<br />
north flank.<br />
When daylight came on the 24th, the<br />
head of the leading kampfgruppe had<br />
advanced well to the northwest of the<br />
Marche-Rochefort road in considerable<br />
strength. In this kampfgruppe were the<br />
reconnaissance battalion, one battalion<br />
of Panthers from the 3d Panzer Regi-<br />
ment, the 304th Panzer Grenadier Regi-<br />
ment, two artillery regiments, a battal-<br />
ion of heavy guns, and two-thirds of the<br />
division flak, the whole extending for<br />
miles. The remainder of the 2d Panzer<br />
remained on the Harsin road southe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Marche under orders from Luettwitz<br />
to protect the corps right shoulder.<br />
The Main Battle Is Joined<br />
24 and 25 December<br />
Pitched battles and fumbling skir-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
mishes flared up all along the VII Corps<br />
front on 24 December. But the VII Corps<br />
front w<strong>as</strong> not a homogeneous line, and<br />
the German drive w<strong>as</strong> not conducted by<br />
division columns whose units were con-<br />
tiguous to each other and flanked by<br />
over-watching screening forces on paral-<br />
lel roads. The opposing commanders by<br />
this time did have a fairly accurate idea<br />
of what formations were on “the enemy<br />
side of the hill,” but neither Americans<br />
nor Germans were too certain <strong>as</strong> to<br />
w<strong>here</strong> these formations would be en-<br />
countered. The hottest points of combat<br />
on the 24th were Rochefort, Buisson-<br />
ville, and the Bourdon sector e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
Hotton-Marche road.<br />
At Rochefort the Panzer Lehr com-<br />
mander began his main attack a couple<br />
of hours after midnight, but the de-<br />
fenders held and made a battle of it in<br />
houses and behind garden walls. Com-<br />
panies I and K of the 333d concentrated<br />
in and around a large hotel, dug in a<br />
brace of 57-mm. antitank guns and a sec-<br />
tion of heavy machine guns in front of<br />
the hotel, and so interdicted the town<br />
square. About 0900 on the 24th the 3d<br />
Battalion lost radio contact with the<br />
division, but four hours later one mes-<br />
sage did reach Marche: an order from<br />
General Bolling to withdraw. By this<br />
time a tree burst from a German 88 had<br />
put the antitank guns out of action. TO<br />
disengage from this house-to-house com-<br />
bat would not be e<strong>as</strong>y. Fortunately the<br />
attackers had their eyes fixed on the mar-<br />
ket place in the center of the town,<br />
apparently with the object of seizing the<br />
crossways t<strong>here</strong> so that armored vehicles<br />
could move through from one edge of<br />
the town to the other. So preoccupied,<br />
they neglected to bar all the exits from<br />
Rochefort. Driven back into a small area
THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT 439<br />
around the battalion command post<br />
w<strong>here</strong> bullet and mortar fire made the<br />
streets “a living inferno,” the surround-<br />
ed garrison made ready for a break.<br />
Enough vehicles had escaped damage to<br />
mount the battalion headquarters and<br />
Company M. The rest of the force<br />
formed for march on foot.<br />
At 1800 the two groups made a con-<br />
certed d<strong>as</strong>h from the town, firing wildly<br />
<strong>as</strong> they went and hurling smoke gre-<br />
nades, which m<strong>as</strong>ked them, momen-<br />
tarily, from a German tank lurking near-<br />
by. Sgt. J. W. Waldron manned a<br />
machine gun <strong>as</strong> a line rear guard, w<strong>as</strong><br />
wounded, but rejoined his company.<br />
(He received the DSC.) The vehicular<br />
column headed west for Givet, and it is<br />
indicative of the widely dispersed and<br />
CAPTURED GERMAN 88-MM. GUN<br />
fragmented nature of the German forces<br />
on this day that the American column<br />
reached the Meuse without being am-<br />
bushed. The foot column, led by Lt.<br />
Leonard R. Carpenter, started north<br />
with the idea of reaching the outposts<br />
of the 3d Armored t<strong>as</strong>k force known to<br />
be t<strong>here</strong>abouts, but <strong>here</strong> the spoor of<br />
the enemy w<strong>as</strong> very strong and move-<br />
ment w<strong>as</strong> slow. During the night some<br />
trucks were sent e<strong>as</strong>t from Givet and<br />
found parts of Companies I and K; two<br />
officers and thirty-three men belonging<br />
to Company I were picked up in an ex-<br />
hausted state by 2d Armored patrols and<br />
brought back to the American lines.<br />
The defense of Rochefort had not<br />
been too costly: fifteen wounded men,<br />
under the care of a volunteer medic,
440 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
were left in the town and another<br />
twenty-five had been killed or captured.<br />
But the Panzer Lehr commander, who<br />
had fought in both engagements, would<br />
later rate the American defense in<br />
Rochefort <strong>as</strong> comparable in courage and<br />
in significance to that at B<strong>as</strong>togne. Sig-<br />
nificantly, the Panzer Lehr Reconnais-<br />
sance Battalion carried the attack for the<br />
Meuse without any help from the rest<br />
of the division until after midnight,<br />
when the 902d finally reached the Buis-<br />
sonville area.<br />
Buissonville had been the primary ob-<br />
jective of the 2d Armored Division when<br />
Harmon first propelled his CCA into<br />
action. True, Rochefort w<strong>as</strong> the goal<br />
when CCA resumed its march on the<br />
morning of the 24th, but Buissonville<br />
first had to be brought under American<br />
control. A glance at the map will show<br />
the re<strong>as</strong>on why.<br />
The village lay in a valley w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
Dinant-Rochefort highway dipped down,<br />
but in addition it controlled the entry<br />
to that highway of a secondary road net<br />
running west from the Marche-Rochefort<br />
road. The hamlet of Humain, four miles<br />
to the e<strong>as</strong>t, w<strong>as</strong> the nodal point of this<br />
secondary system.<br />
During the night the Humain-Buis-<br />
sonville road had been jammed with<br />
German columns from the 2d Panzer<br />
reconnaissance battalion and advance<br />
guard. But now the wealth of good,<br />
hard-surfaced roads which characterize<br />
this part of Belgium came into play.<br />
Entering the main highway at Buisson-<br />
ville, the German units had gone north<br />
for about a mile, then made a V-turn<br />
back onto a secondary road running<br />
straight west to Conjoux, a village four<br />
miles south of Ciney. The Belgian tele-<br />
phone operator at Conjoux attempted to<br />
get word of this movement to the Amer-<br />
icans, but the message had to p<strong>as</strong>s sur-<br />
reptitiously through a number of hands<br />
and did not reach the 2d Armored com-<br />
mand post until the afternoon of the<br />
24th. The CCA sortie from Ciney, <strong>as</strong> a<br />
result, w<strong>as</strong> being made obliquely to the<br />
German axis of advance and would<br />
intersect the enemy line of march at<br />
Buissonville only after the leading<br />
kampfgruppe of the 2d Panzer had p<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
on to the west.<br />
This is not to say that Collier’s t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
forces encountered no opposition when<br />
CCA resumed the attack on the morn-<br />
ing of the 24th. Flank guard and block-<br />
ing detachments backed by tanks had<br />
been left to screen the 2d Panzer line of<br />
communications on the north and these<br />
had to be disposed of. Furthermore,<br />
CCA had to proceed with some caution,<br />
feeling out to the flanks <strong>as</strong> it went; in-<br />
deed General Harmon added a recon-<br />
naissance company to Collier’s command<br />
because “the situation is changing all the<br />
time.” The leading American t<strong>as</strong>k force<br />
reached Buissonville in early afternoon<br />
and formed for an <strong>as</strong>sault to encircle the<br />
village from the north. By chance the<br />
second t<strong>as</strong>k force, advancing in echelon<br />
on the right flank, had run into antitank<br />
fire and, in process of maneuvering onto<br />
a ridge overlooking the German guns,<br />
saw its sister detachment moving into the<br />
attack. An enemy column, coming in<br />
from Havrenne, appeared about the<br />
same time on the opposite side of the<br />
village.<br />
While the American attack swept<br />
through and round Buissonville, the<br />
tank and tank destroyer crews on the<br />
ridge opened fire, laying their guns at<br />
four thousand yards, and directing the<br />
salvos cr<strong>as</strong>hing in from the field batteries
THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT 441<br />
supporting CCA. The final tally w<strong>as</strong> 38<br />
wheeled vehicles, 4 antitank guns, 6<br />
pieces of medium artillery, 108 prisoners,<br />
and a large but uncounted number of<br />
German dead. After this action a squad-<br />
ron of P–38’s strafed the village, prob-<br />
ably on a mission which had been called<br />
for before the <strong>as</strong>sault, killing one Amer-<br />
ican officer and wounding another be-<br />
fore the airplanes could be diverted.<br />
With Buissonville in hand, Harmon<br />
ordered Col. John MacDonald, whose<br />
4th Cavalry Group had just been at-<br />
tached to the 2d Armored, to take Hu-<br />
main and thus put a stopper in the<br />
narrow channel between his division<br />
and the 84th which led to the west and<br />
the rear of the Marche position. Mac-<br />
Donald had only the 24th Squadron-<br />
his 4th Squadron w<strong>as</strong> deploying in the<br />
west <strong>as</strong> a screen between CCA and CCB<br />
-and in the early evening he sent Troop<br />
A into Humain. The troopers experi-<br />
enced little opposition. Mines and booby<br />
traps were their greatest hazard, and by<br />
midnight they had full control of the<br />
village.<br />
All through the day messages had<br />
come into the 2d Armored Division<br />
headquarters telling of German tanks in<br />
incre<strong>as</strong>ing numbers in and around Cel-<br />
les, a main crossroads village southwest<br />
of Ciney and only four miles from the<br />
Meuse River. During the morning the<br />
British light armored cavalry patrolling<br />
this area had been forced back toward<br />
Dinant. At midday two P–51’s flew over<br />
to take a look at Celles but got an ex-<br />
ceedingly warm reception from flak bat-<br />
teries t<strong>here</strong> and were driven off. Further<br />
evidence of a large German concentra-<br />
tion came in the afternoon when the<br />
Belgian report of enemy columns in Con-<br />
joux finally reached the Americans.<br />
Harmon had not waited for confirma-<br />
tion of the early British reports, the right<br />
and rear of CCA being too exposed for<br />
that. At 1045 he ordered CCB (Brig.<br />
Gen. Isaac D. White) to secure Ciney-<br />
at the moment occupied by some of<br />
Collier’s troops-“<strong>as</strong> a b<strong>as</strong>e for future<br />
operations.” At the same time the divi-<br />
sion artillery commander, Colonel Hut-<br />
ton, sent two battalions of armored ar-<br />
tillery into firing positions north of<br />
Ciney. (Throughout the day artillery<br />
support for both the 2d Armored and the<br />
84th had been rendered under difficult<br />
circumstances. The location of friendly<br />
units w<strong>as</strong> none too certain and a num-<br />
ber of the advanced outpost positions<br />
along the VII Corps front. were beyond<br />
the range of their own guns.)<br />
The e<strong>as</strong>tern flank of the VII Corps w<strong>as</strong><br />
the third area of hot combat on the 24th.<br />
On the previous night the 116th Panzer<br />
Division finally had begun to build up<br />
a bridgehead on the west bank of the<br />
Ourthe. Perhaps Manteuffel’s visit had<br />
had some effect, or, more likely, the<br />
116th had more troops for the attack<br />
now that reinforcements were arriving<br />
to take on the Americans in the Soy-<br />
Hotton sector. The mission set for Gen-<br />
eral Waldenburg’s division w<strong>as</strong> of criti-<br />
cal importance to the Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> attack. First, the 116th Panzer w<strong>as</strong><br />
to break through the American position<br />
forward of the Hotton-Marche road.<br />
Then, having cleaned out Marche in the<br />
process, the division w<strong>as</strong> to swing north<br />
onto the Baillonville road, which offered<br />
good tank going, drive west through<br />
Pessoux, and make contact with the 2d<br />
Panzer Division in the neighborhood of<br />
Ciney. At that point the two divisions<br />
would provide reciprocal protection for<br />
their inner flanks.
442 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Waldenburg w<strong>as</strong> low on fuel for his<br />
tanks but attempted to set the ball roll-<br />
ing by sending two rifle companies<br />
through the dark to infiltrate the Amer-<br />
ican lines at the junction point of the<br />
334th and 335th Regiments. The tactic–<br />
penetration along boundary lines–w<strong>as</strong><br />
a German favorite, attended by success<br />
in the initial days of the offensive. The<br />
two companies (dismounted troops of<br />
the division reconnaissance battalion)<br />
stealthily worked their way forward and<br />
at dawn were to the rear of the 334th.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> they sought cover on a wooded<br />
ridge north of Verdenne. This village,<br />
outposted by the Americans, w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
immediate goal of the attack planned for<br />
the 24th. Commanding the Marche-<br />
Hampteau road–roughly the line held<br />
by the left wing of the 84th Division–it<br />
afforded immediate access via a good<br />
secondary route to Bourdon on the main<br />
Hotton-Marche highway, and its posses-<br />
sion would offer a springboard for the<br />
German armored thrust.<br />
The 116th Panzer Division did not<br />
attack with daylight, for its fuel trucks<br />
had not yet appeared. Instead Walden-<br />
burg sent detachments of the 60th Regi-<br />
ment into the Bois de Chardonne, the<br />
western extrusion of a large wood lot<br />
partially held by the Germans southwest<br />
of Verdenne. Unusual movement in the<br />
Bois w<strong>as</strong> noticed by the Americans dur-<br />
ing the morning, but this came into<br />
really serious light about noon when a<br />
prisoner revealed the presence of the two<br />
companies behind the 334th. General<br />
Bolling gat<strong>here</strong>d the 1st Battalion, 334th,<br />
and three tank platoons of the 771st<br />
Tank Battalion to trap the infiltrators.<br />
It appears that his opponent, General<br />
Waldenburg, had postponed the Ger-<br />
man attack for an hour or so but that<br />
this order did not reach the two forward<br />
companies. When the American tanks<br />
suddenly appeared on the wooded ridge<br />
north of Verdenne, they ran head on into<br />
the enemy just <strong>as</strong>sembling at the wood’s<br />
edge in <strong>as</strong>sault formation. The Germans<br />
broke and fled, some fifty were captured,<br />
and the woods were cleared.<br />
But this w<strong>as</strong> only the first act. An hour<br />
later five enemy tanks and two half-<br />
tracks carrying or covering a hundred or<br />
so grenadiers struck Verdenne from the<br />
south, engaged the second platoon of<br />
Company I in what Waldenburg later<br />
called “a bitter house-to-house battle,”<br />
finally overwhelmed the Americans, and<br />
pushed on to a château a stone’s throw<br />
north of the village. In a l<strong>as</strong>t <strong>as</strong>sault at<br />
eventide the attackers drove this wedge<br />
deeper. Companies I and K of the 334th<br />
fell back to a new line barely in front of<br />
the crucial Marche-Hotton road, and<br />
German light artillery moved up to<br />
bring the road under fire.<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve in the far western sec-<br />
tor of the Ardennes Bulge found various<br />
shadings of une<strong>as</strong>iness in the American<br />
headquarters and a pall of foreboding,<br />
silver-lined by the proximity of the<br />
Meuse, in the German. The attack<br />
planned for the VII Corps had turned<br />
into a defensive battle. On the e<strong>as</strong>t wing<br />
the 3d Armored (–CCB) w<strong>as</strong> hard<br />
pressed and some of its troops were sur-<br />
rounded-indeed two regiments of the<br />
75th Infantry Division were en route to<br />
help General Rose. The 84th Division,<br />
so far <strong>as</strong> then w<strong>as</strong> known, had lost a bat-<br />
talion in Rochefort, might be driven out<br />
of Marche, and stood exposed to an ar-<br />
mored exploitation of the penetration<br />
made at Verdenne. The 2d Armored<br />
Division had had a good day but w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
yet securely linked to the 84th on the
THE VII CORPS MOVES TO BLUNT THE SALIENT 443<br />
left and could only surmise what tank<br />
strength the Germans had accumulated<br />
opposite CCB on the right.<br />
Field Marshal Montgomery, chipper<br />
<strong>as</strong> always but cautious, had taken steps<br />
during the day to bring the 51st Division<br />
(British) across the Meuse and into<br />
backstop position behind the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
in the sector southe<strong>as</strong>t of Liège. Other<br />
British troops were on the move to <strong>as</strong>sist<br />
the 29th Armoured Brigade (British) if<br />
the enemy should hit the bridges at<br />
Givet or Namur. This w<strong>as</strong> good news to<br />
the First <strong>Army</strong> commander and his staff,<br />
not to mention that some elation w<strong>as</strong><br />
abroad <strong>as</strong> the result of Allied air force<br />
activity on this clear day and the reports<br />
of prisoners and booty taken from the<br />
1st SS Panzer Division at La Gleize.<br />
The gloomy side of the picture w<strong>as</strong> all<br />
too readily apparent. The fall of St. Vith<br />
had opened the way for fresh forces and<br />
new pressure against the army center and<br />
right. The 82d Airborne Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
exposed to entrapment in the Manhay<br />
sector and in the course of the evening<br />
Hodges would order a withdrawal. The<br />
situation <strong>as</strong> it appeared in the VII Corps<br />
on the army right wing w<strong>as</strong>, <strong>as</strong> just<br />
described, somewhat of a cliff-hanger.<br />
On the left wing, in the V Corps sector,<br />
the enemy appeared ready to resume<br />
strong offensive operations, and after<br />
their Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve supper Hodges<br />
and Huebner sat down to plan the evac-<br />
uation of the corps’ heavy equipment in<br />
order to leave the roads free in the event<br />
that withdrawal to the north became<br />
mandatory.<br />
In the higher echelons of German<br />
command the attitude on Der Heilige<br />
Abend became more somber <strong>as</strong> the<br />
distance between the particular head-<br />
quarters and the 2d Panzer position at<br />
the tip of the Bulge diminished. Rund-<br />
stedt seems to have become reconciled,<br />
with the fatalism and aloofness of the<br />
aged and veteran soldier, to whatever<br />
the fortunes of war now might bring.<br />
Model, the commander of <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
B, w<strong>as</strong> outwardly optimistic; his order<br />
for Christm<strong>as</strong> Day called for the p<strong>as</strong>sage<br />
of the Meuse and the capture of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne. This official mien of optimism<br />
contr<strong>as</strong>ts sharply with the attitude his<br />
personal staff had noted on 18 December<br />
when, it since h<strong>as</strong> been reported, he<br />
phoned Rundstedt and Jodl to say that<br />
the offensive had failed. Perhaps he saw<br />
in the events of 24 December the possi-<br />
bility that the Meuse at le<strong>as</strong>t might be<br />
reached and some degree of tactical suc-<br />
cess e<strong>as</strong>t of the river be attained, thus<br />
confirming his earlier opposition to the<br />
Big Solution dictated by Hitler and Jodl.<br />
Manteuffel, <strong>as</strong> Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> com-<br />
mander, w<strong>as</strong> the man in the middle. He<br />
w<strong>as</strong> well aware of the exposed and pre-<br />
carious position of the 2d Panzer Divi-<br />
sion. He had traveled the forward roads<br />
at the tip of the salient, and his practiced<br />
eye recognized that the narrow corridor<br />
to the Meuse must be widened if the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t stage of the drive to the river w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
be logistically supported. Doubtless he<br />
recognized the tactical merit of Luett-<br />
witz’ suggestion, probably made late in<br />
the afternoon of the 24th, that the for-<br />
ward columns of the XLVII Panzer<br />
Corps should be withdrawn from their<br />
position of dangerous isolation until<br />
such time <strong>as</strong> reinforcements arrived. On<br />
the other hand Manteuffel w<strong>as</strong> well<br />
aware of the Fuehrer’s attitude toward<br />
surrendering ground and could not pos-<br />
sibly acquiesce in Luettwitz’ proposal.<br />
During the evening Manteuffel tele-<br />
phoned Jodl with a personal and desper-
444<br />
ate plea for <strong>as</strong>sistance: he argued that his<br />
army, not the Sixth, w<strong>as</strong> carrying the<br />
main effort of the offensive and that the<br />
dions in the OKW reserve earmarked<br />
for Sepp Dietrich should be rele<strong>as</strong>ed at<br />
once to reinforce the attack to the Meuse.<br />
It would appear that Jodl spoke re<strong>as</strong>suringly<br />
of divisions en route to the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> but this must have brought<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
very cold comfort to Manteuffel. 8<br />
8 The problems facing the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
commander are graphically presented in MSS<br />
ETHINT-45 and 46, and MSS #B-151, B-151a,<br />
all by Manteuffel. The story of the 116th Panzer<br />
Division is recounted by the division commander<br />
(Waldenburg) in MS #A-873. The best of the<br />
fragmentary personal accounts on the history of<br />
the 2d Panzer Division is that by Lt. Col. Ruediger<br />
Weiz in MS #B-456.
CHAPTER XIX<br />
The Battle of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
The Initial Deployment E<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
The one standing order that General<br />
Middleton gave General McAulliff e be-<br />
fore leaving B<strong>as</strong>togne on the morning of<br />
19 December w<strong>as</strong>: “Hold B<strong>as</strong>togne.” *<br />
Both generals felt that the enemy needed<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne and the entrance it afforded<br />
to a wider complex of roads leading<br />
west. (Map VI) During the night of the<br />
* The most complete story of the siege of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne is S. L. A. Marshall’s B<strong>as</strong>togne: The<br />
First Eight Days (W<strong>as</strong>hington: The Infantry<br />
Journal Press, 1946). The then Colonel Marshall<br />
w<strong>as</strong> on the scene, had complete access to the daily<br />
record entries, and w<strong>as</strong> persona grata to the entire<br />
command, this happy circumstance resulting in<br />
the fine collection of combat interviews which<br />
formed the b<strong>as</strong>is for this interesting and graphic<br />
account. It is worth noting that the authors of<br />
the official history of the foist did not write a<br />
chapter on B<strong>as</strong>togne but simply introduced an<br />
abridged version of Marshall’s book. (The present<br />
author h<strong>as</strong> borrowed extensively from Brigadier<br />
General Marshall, but the careful reader will<br />
notice quite different interpretations of the same<br />
actions b<strong>as</strong>ed on the same source materials.<br />
Marshall, concerned with the heroic story of an<br />
encircled unit, focuses on that unit, in effect look-<br />
ing from B<strong>as</strong>togne at the perimeter. The present<br />
author, engaged in presenting the over-all cam-<br />
paign, directs his attention from the periphery<br />
inward.) The G–3 journal of the 101st is rather<br />
cursory. The 501st Summary of Actions is re-<br />
constructed from memory since most of the regi-<br />
mental records were lost; the 502d AAR is slim; the<br />
327th Narrative is terse hut informative; the<br />
506th AAR is the most complete and useful of<br />
any of the regimental reports. See also Scrapbook<br />
506th Parachute Infantry Regiment (Munich,<br />
1945)<br />
18th the two commanders met in the VIII<br />
Corps command post to confer on the un-<br />
certain tactical situation and to give Colo-<br />
nel Ewell, whose regiment would first be<br />
committed, his instructions. The map<br />
spread out before Ewell showed a few<br />
blue-penciled marks e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
w<strong>here</strong> the American armored groups<br />
were believed to be fighting at their<br />
original roadblock positions. General<br />
Middleton told Ewell that his job would<br />
be to make contact with these endan-<br />
gered forward posts. Ewell, however, w<strong>as</strong><br />
interested in the red-penciled lines and<br />
circles which showed the enemy between<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne and the armored roadblocks.<br />
In view of the uncertain situation, he<br />
suggested that he be given “mission-type<br />
orders” which would permit his 50 1st<br />
Parachute Infantry some flexibility of<br />
action. McAuliffe agreed, <strong>as</strong> did Middle-<br />
ton, but the latter still hoped that the<br />
roadblock defenders at Allerborn, eight<br />
miles to the e<strong>as</strong>t on the B<strong>as</strong>togne road,<br />
would somehow survive until the 501st<br />
reached them. McAuliffe’s order, then,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> for Ewell to move out at 0600, attack<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tward, and develop the situation.<br />
At the appointed hour on 19 Decem-<br />
ber Ewell’s 501st Parachute Infantry<br />
marched out of the <strong>as</strong>sembly area in col-<br />
umn of battalions. Ewell knew that this<br />
w<strong>as</strong> no time to engage in the all-out,<br />
full-bodied <strong>as</strong>sault tactics to which the<br />
paratroopers were accustomed. He told
BASTOGNE
448 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
his officers to “take it e<strong>as</strong>y,” avoid com-<br />
mitment to an action which would in-<br />
volve their whole force, and deploy to<br />
right and left <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> they hit resist-<br />
ance so that they would not be e<strong>as</strong>ily cut<br />
off and surrounded. 1<br />
Hindsight, of course, bestows a view<br />
of the American and German disposi-<br />
tions at 0600, when the 101st advance<br />
guard marched out, which w<strong>as</strong> denied<br />
Ewell and the corps and division staffs<br />
in B<strong>as</strong>togne. The battles already de-<br />
scribed were now coming to a close on<br />
the roads, in the villages, and through<br />
the woods e<strong>as</strong>t of the town <strong>as</strong> the 101st<br />
w<strong>as</strong> taking its stance. During the night<br />
of 18 December the three small t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
forces of CCR, 9th Armored Division,<br />
which Middleton had ordered Colonel<br />
Gilbreth to position on and overwatch-<br />
ing the Allerborn-B<strong>as</strong>togne road (N12),<br />
were cut to pieces. Some men and ve-<br />
hicles would escape to take a part in the<br />
fight for B<strong>as</strong>togne, although some of<br />
Colonel Booth’s command took six days<br />
of dodging the enemy before they<br />
reached the American lines. At Long-<br />
villy, next, and to the west, on the B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne road, Gilbreth had gat<strong>here</strong>d what<br />
w<strong>as</strong> left of CCR and its attached troops<br />
to fight a rear guard action until the 19th<br />
dawned and an orderly withdrawal<br />
might be effected.<br />
1 Middleton recalls that he directed McAuliffe<br />
to reinforce the 10th ,Armored roadblock on the<br />
Longvilly road. (Ltr, Middleton to Col Marshall,<br />
1 Jul 45.) The S–3 journal of CCB, 10th Armored<br />
Division, notes at 0740 on 19 December that<br />
Ewell’s mission is to relieve “the surrounded<br />
groups” and <strong>as</strong>sist CCB. The 101st AAR simply<br />
states that Ewell w<strong>as</strong> ordered to attack to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t and “secure B<strong>as</strong>togne.” The story <strong>as</strong> given<br />
in the text is b<strong>as</strong>ed on Ewell’s recollections (in<br />
a conversation with the author on 22 July 1961)<br />
and squares with information given the author<br />
by Middleton and McAuliffe.<br />
Gilbreth started his guns displacing to<br />
the rear some time before daybreak, but<br />
the main force commenced to defile<br />
through the western exit from Longvilly<br />
about 0800, only to be ambushed and<br />
thrown into disorder when approaching<br />
Mageret, midway between Longvilly and<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. Team Cherry (Lt. Col. Henry<br />
T. Cherry) of CCB, 10th Armored Divi-<br />
sion, which had been sent along the road<br />
toward Longvilly the previous evening,<br />
found itself involved in a series of dis-<br />
jointed actions <strong>as</strong> enemy troops cut the<br />
highway. Team Hyduke (1st Lt. Ed-<br />
ward P. Hyduke) w<strong>as</strong> caught up in the<br />
fight e<strong>as</strong>t of Mageret, subsequently<br />
losing all its vehicles in a sharp and<br />
aggressive armored action which the 2d<br />
Panzer commander dignified <strong>as</strong> an Amer-<br />
ican “counterattack.” (Late on the after-<br />
noon of the 19th Lieutenant Hyduke led<br />
his men on foot out of the melee under<br />
orders to rejoin CCB. He w<strong>as</strong> afterward<br />
killed at B<strong>as</strong>togne.)<br />
Team Ryerson (Capt. William F.<br />
Ryerson), the main force belonging to<br />
Cherry, had laagered during the night<br />
between Mageret and Longvilly–and<br />
thus would fight an action almost inde-<br />
pendently of the Longvilly column–but<br />
before daybreak Ryerson knew that the<br />
enemy w<strong>as</strong> in Mageret and that he would<br />
have to punch his way back to the west.<br />
Cherry sent orders confirming this with-<br />
drawal about 0830. Ryerson found his<br />
team outnumbered and outgunned by<br />
the Germans holding Mageret, but on<br />
the night of the 19th four squads of his<br />
armored infantry held a narrow foothold<br />
in a few houses on the e<strong>as</strong>tern edge of<br />
the village, waiting t<strong>here</strong> for help prom-<br />
ised from the west. Colonel Cherry had<br />
gone back to B<strong>as</strong>togne to see the CCB<br />
commander late on the 18th, returning
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 449<br />
t<strong>here</strong>after to his own headquarters out-<br />
side Neffe (a mile and a quarter south-<br />
west of Mageret) with word that the<br />
101st would reinforce his command the<br />
next day. On the road back, however, he<br />
learned that the Germans were in Mag-<br />
eret and his troops were cut off. About<br />
the time Ewell’s paratroopers debouched<br />
on the B<strong>as</strong>togne road, Neffe w<strong>as</strong> hit by<br />
tanks and infantry from Panzer Lehr;<br />
some hours later Cherry’s detachment<br />
would pull back to Mont. 2<br />
On the morning of 19 December,<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore, the job confronting the 501st<br />
w<strong>as</strong> that of developing, fixing, and fight-<br />
ing the German detachments, now in<br />
strength, which stood to the rear of the<br />
erstwhile American blocking positions<br />
and presaged the coming main effort to<br />
cr<strong>as</strong>h the panzer columns through or<br />
around B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The German High Command w<strong>as</strong><br />
aware that. the two American airborne<br />
divisions had orders to enter the battle;<br />
in the late afternoon of 18 December<br />
intercepted radio messages to this effect<br />
reached OB WEST. German intelligence<br />
knew that the Americans were moving<br />
by truck and so estimated that none of<br />
these new troops would appear in the<br />
line before noon on the 19th. The Ger-<br />
man staffs believed that the two divi-<br />
sions would be deployed along a front<br />
extending from B<strong>as</strong>togne to the north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. In any c<strong>as</strong>e the German attack plan<br />
w<strong>as</strong> unfolding about <strong>as</strong> scheduled and<br />
2 On the earlier actions by the armored units<br />
see Chapter XXI and also the documents cited<br />
t<strong>here</strong>. The CCB, 10th Armored, AAR and S–3<br />
journal are among the most valuable of the docu-<br />
ments describing the B<strong>as</strong>togne operation. The<br />
personal recollections of the CCB commander<br />
have been incorporated in Nichol’s Impact: The<br />
Battle Story of the Tenth Armored Division.<br />
three German divisions were bearing<br />
down on B<strong>as</strong>togne. The 2d Panzer Divi-<br />
sion’s successes during the night of 18<br />
December against the outpost positions<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Longvilly had netted forty Amer-<br />
ican tanks, and the apparent crumbling<br />
of the l<strong>as</strong>t defenses e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
promised quick entry to that city on the<br />
19th.<br />
Actually the three German divisions<br />
moving toward B<strong>as</strong>togne were not all<br />
maneuvering to attack the city. Lauch-<br />
ert’s 2d Panzer Division had other fish<br />
to fry–its objective w<strong>as</strong> the Meuse<br />
bridges–and when daylight came on the<br />
19th the division advance guard w<strong>as</strong><br />
working its way to byp<strong>as</strong>s B<strong>as</strong>togne in<br />
the north. The 2d Panzer’s end run,<br />
across country and on miserable third-<br />
cl<strong>as</strong>s roads, collided with Maj. William<br />
R. Desobry’s t<strong>as</strong>k force from CCB at<br />
Noville (four miles north of B<strong>as</strong>togne),<br />
then blundered into a series of sharp<br />
actions reaching back to Longvilly.<br />
On the left the Panzer Lehr, having<br />
seized Mageret during the night, began<br />
an attack about 0500 on the 19th de-<br />
signed to take B<strong>as</strong>togne; it w<strong>as</strong> a part of<br />
this forward detachment of Panzer Lehr<br />
which hit Cherry’s headquarters at<br />
Neffe. Close on the heels of Panzer Lehr,<br />
two regiments of the 26th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division had made a right wheel<br />
with the intention of circling through<br />
Longvilly and Luzery so <strong>as</strong> to enter<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne from the north via the Noville<br />
road. Kokott’s grenadiers, who had ac-<br />
complished a truly remarkable feat in<br />
keeping pace with the mechanized col-<br />
umns of the Panzer Lehr, by now were<br />
spent. The regimental trains were far to<br />
the rear and resupply had to be made.<br />
Furthermore the boundaries and attack<br />
plans for the three divisions converging
450 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
on B<strong>as</strong>togne were so confused that it<br />
would take some time for the 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division (–) to orient and<br />
co-ordinate its attack. On the morning<br />
of the 19th Kokott’s two regiments lay<br />
quiescent and exhausted in the scattered<br />
woods southe<strong>as</strong>t of Longvilly. Only the<br />
advance guard of the Panzer Lehr, t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
fore, w<strong>as</strong> attacking directly toward B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne when the paratroopers of the 501st<br />
marched on to the B<strong>as</strong>togne-Longvilly<br />
road. 3<br />
Ewell had his 1st Battalion (Maj.<br />
Raymond V. Bottomly, Jr.) out <strong>as</strong> ad-<br />
vance guard. The road w<strong>as</strong> curtained at<br />
intervals by swirling fog and from time<br />
to time rain squalls swept in. Some<br />
2,000 yards out of the city (it now w<strong>as</strong><br />
about 0820) the battalion ran onto a few<br />
howitzers from the 9th Armored whose<br />
crews were “ready, willing and able,” <strong>as</strong><br />
the journals report it, to support the<br />
501st. Less than a thousand yards be-<br />
yond, the advance guard encountered<br />
the enemy near the railroad station at<br />
the edge of Neffe; <strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> the road-<br />
block which the Panzer Lehr had<br />
wrested from Cherry’s headquarters de-<br />
tachment.<br />
On the previous evening the VIII<br />
Corps commander had sent the 158th<br />
Engineer Combat Battalion (Lt. Col.<br />
Sam Tabets) to establish a line e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne between Foy and the Neffe<br />
road, Nearly a thousand antitank mines<br />
had been scraped together from other<br />
corps engineers to aid the 158th, and at<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t part of these were laid in front of<br />
3 Generals Kokott and Bayerlein were responsible<br />
for the initial investiture of B<strong>as</strong>togne, and their<br />
accounts, b<strong>as</strong>ic for “the other side of the hill,”<br />
can be found in eight manuscripts: ETHINT–44,<br />
B–040, and P–32d by Kokott; and A–941 through<br />
A–945 by Bayerlein.<br />
the engineer foxholes during the night.<br />
When the 158th reported about 0200<br />
that its outpost at Mageret had been<br />
overrun, Middleton sent what help he<br />
could–five light tanks taken from ord-<br />
nance repair shops. At daybreak two<br />
enemy rifle companies, led by a few<br />
tanks, hit Company B, whose right flank<br />
touched the B<strong>as</strong>togne highway near<br />
Neffe. The engineers succeeded in halt-<br />
ing the advance along the road, although<br />
at a cost of some thirty c<strong>as</strong>ualties. Pvt.<br />
Bernard Michin seems to have blocked<br />
the panzers when he put a bazooka round<br />
into the leader at ten yards’ range. Mean-<br />
while Team Cherry had lost its road-<br />
block at the Neffe station but momen-<br />
tarily had stopped the Germans at Neffe<br />
village. Enemy pressure then e<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
somewhat; perhaps the German infantry<br />
were waiting for their tanks to break<br />
through at Mageret. The fight had<br />
slackened to a small arms duel when<br />
Ewell’s paratroopers came on the scene. 4<br />
Feeling carefully to the north and<br />
south of the highway, the 1st Battalion<br />
found that the Germans were deployed<br />
in some force and that this w<strong>as</strong> no occa-<br />
sion for a quick knockout blow to handle<br />
a single roadblock. About 0900 Ewell<br />
turned the 2d Battalion (Maj. Sammie<br />
N. Homan) off the road in a maneuver<br />
on the left of the vanguard intended to<br />
seize the higher ground near the village<br />
of Bizory and Hill 510, a fairly substan-<br />
tial rise to the e<strong>as</strong>t which overlooked<br />
both Neffe and Bizory. When the 3d<br />
Battalion (Lt. Col. George M. Griswold)<br />
4 S. L. A. Marshall, who interviewed Bayerlein,<br />
says that the Panzer Lehr commander momentarily<br />
lost his nerve on the 19th and failed to prod his<br />
troops forward personally. (Marshall, B<strong>as</strong>togne,<br />
pp: 184-86.) Bayerlein admits to his great sur-<br />
prise when he encountered strong armored opposi-<br />
tion e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne. MS # A–341 (Bayerlein).
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 451<br />
came up, Ewell sent it to the right with<br />
orders to take Mont and the ridge south<br />
of Neffe. By noon the regimental attack<br />
had attained most of its objectives.<br />
(Bizory already w<strong>as</strong> outposted by troops<br />
of the 158th Engineer Combat Battal-<br />
ion.) Hill 510, however, w<strong>as</strong> no e<strong>as</strong>y nut<br />
to crack. The enemy held the position<br />
with automatic weapons sweeping the<br />
bare glacis to west and south-<strong>here</strong> the<br />
paratroopers made no progress. On the<br />
right one of Griswold’s platoons arrived<br />
in time to give Colonel Cherry a hand<br />
in the fight at the Neffe château com-<br />
mand post and, when the Americans<br />
were burned out, the subsequent with-<br />
drawal to Mont. The 3d Battalion had<br />
not been able to get around Neffe, but<br />
Company I did go <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Wardin,<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t of Neffe, w<strong>here</strong> it ambushed a<br />
25-man patrol.<br />
The appearance of the Americans in<br />
this area, little more than a mile south of<br />
Mageret, w<strong>as</strong> interpreted immediately<br />
<strong>as</strong> a flanking threat to the two grenadier<br />
regiments of the Panzer Lehr which had<br />
wheeled to the right and away from<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne to engage the American col-<br />
umns transfixed on the Mageret-Long-<br />
villy road. Bayerlein detached a part of<br />
his reconnaissance battalion to meet this<br />
threat. The Americans made a fight of<br />
it inside Wardin, retreating from house<br />
to house <strong>as</strong> the long-barreled self-pro-<br />
pelled guns bl<strong>as</strong>ted in the walls. One<br />
paratrooper walked into the street to<br />
confront one of the guns with a bazooka;<br />
he got the gun, then w<strong>as</strong> cut down.<br />
Finally the guns jolted the paratroopers<br />
out of Wardin; they had inflicted thirty-<br />
nine c<strong>as</strong>ualties on Company I, all of<br />
whose officers were hit, and killed Capt.<br />
Claude D. Wallace, Jr., the company<br />
commander.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the west, near the hamlet of Mar-<br />
vie, lay the tanks and armored infantry<br />
of Team O’Hara (Lt. Col. James<br />
O’Hara) holding the right of the three<br />
blocking positions set up by CCB, 10th<br />
Armored, the day before. O’Hara thus<br />
far had seen no Germans. His first warn-<br />
ing that the fight w<strong>as</strong> expanding in his<br />
direction w<strong>as</strong> the “stragglers of airborne<br />
around us” and high velocity shellfire<br />
directed at his left tank platoon. For<br />
some re<strong>as</strong>on the enemy failed to close<br />
with O’Hara, perhaps because of the<br />
low, clinging fog which had reduced visi-<br />
bility to about seventy-five feet. Ordered<br />
to do so by Colonel Roberts, the CCB<br />
commander, O’Hara sent tanks back in-<br />
to Wardin, but the village w<strong>as</strong> empty.<br />
The tanks retired to the Marvie position<br />
<strong>as</strong> dark came on, and late in the evening<br />
Panzer Lehr occupied Wardin.<br />
A message from McAuliffe ended this<br />
initial day of battle for the 501st and<br />
the regiment dug in w<strong>here</strong> it stood.<br />
Ewell now had a fair picture of the<br />
enemy to his front but no clear idea of<br />
the fate or location of Team Cherry’s<br />
main force, not to mention the CCR<br />
roadblock detachments.<br />
Although the 501st had deployed suc-<br />
cessfully <strong>as</strong>tride the main road e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne and had developed a sketchy<br />
outline of the most advanced German<br />
positions, it had not at any time con-<br />
fronted the main German forces. These,<br />
the bulk of Panzer Lehr and the two for-<br />
ward regiments of the 26th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division, spent most of the day<br />
chopping down the American column<br />
trapped between Mageret and Long-<br />
villy. Kokott apparently had expected to<br />
push his two grenadier regiments un-<br />
opposed through Longvilly, <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong><br />
they were rested, in a circling march to
452<br />
enter B<strong>as</strong>togne from the north, but the<br />
German corps commander, General<br />
Luettwitz, himself took these regiments<br />
out of Kokott’s hand and thrust them<br />
into the battle with the American rear<br />
guard at Longvilly–which held t<strong>here</strong><br />
longer than expected-and against the<br />
retreating column en route to Mageret.<br />
Suffice it to say that the 501st had been<br />
effectively debarred from the Longvilly<br />
arena by the Panzer Lehr troops holding<br />
Neffe, Hill 510, and the stopper position<br />
at Mageret. By the evening of the 19th<br />
the American troops e<strong>as</strong>t of Mageret<br />
were in varying stages of tactical dissolu-<br />
tion-all but Team Ryerson, still clutch-<br />
ing its piece of Mageret village. Luett-<br />
witz w<strong>as</strong> elated by this victory over the<br />
American armor (which <strong>as</strong> an old tanker<br />
he attributed in large part to the supe-<br />
riority of the Panther tank gun), but he<br />
realized that a precious day had been<br />
lost and with it the chance of an armored<br />
coup de main at B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
At Noville, the left of the three block-<br />
ing positions, Middleton had <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
Colonel Roberts and CCB. Here Team<br />
Desobry, organized around fifteen me-<br />
dium tanks, stood athwart the main<br />
paved highway running north from B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne to Houffalize. This force had been<br />
in position about five hours, reporting<br />
all quiet, when at 0720 on the 19th Ger-<br />
man half-tracks hit the American road-<br />
blocks. Americans and Germans pitched<br />
grenades at each other in the fog and<br />
one or two panzers reached the village<br />
itself. The enemy-probably a patrol<br />
feeling a way in front of Lauchert’s 2d<br />
Panzer– soon pulled out, and the noise<br />
of battle died away.<br />
The VIII Corps commander, much<br />
concerned by the gap which he knew<br />
existed between his southern troops and<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
those of his corps somew<strong>here</strong> to the<br />
north, ordered Desobry to investigate<br />
the town of Houffalize. (During the<br />
night, a patrol Desobry had sent in that<br />
direction reported the road open.) Be-<br />
fore anything could be done about the<br />
Houffalize mission, the Germans un-<br />
le<strong>as</strong>hed their artillery against Noville.<br />
Lauchert, intent on regaining the mo-<br />
mentum which the 2d Panzer had lost<br />
in the night fighting around Allerborn<br />
and Longvilly, and determined to get<br />
off the miserable side roads which he<br />
had chosen <strong>as</strong> a quick way around B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne, put all the guns that had kept<br />
pace with the forward elements into a<br />
shoot to bl<strong>as</strong>t a way through to the west.<br />
At 1000 the fog curtain suddenly parted<br />
revealing a landscape dotted with Ger-<br />
man tanks-at le<strong>as</strong>t thirty of them. Four-<br />
teen tanks from the 3d Panzer Regiment<br />
made a try for Noville, coming in from<br />
the north. Several bogged down in a vain<br />
attempt to maneuver off the road; others<br />
were stopped by Desobry’s company of<br />
Sherman tanks and by tank destroyer<br />
fire. On the e<strong>as</strong>t the enemy had started<br />
an infantry <strong>as</strong>sault, but the fog lifted<br />
before the first waves reached the village<br />
and, suddenly divested of cover, most of<br />
the attackers turned and ran.<br />
Desobry could not know that Noville<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the focus of the entire 2d Panzer<br />
maneuver, but he did <strong>as</strong>k for permission<br />
to withdraw. Roberts replied that Deso-<br />
bry should use his own judgment, then<br />
added that more tank destroyers were<br />
on the way from B<strong>as</strong>togne (Desobry had<br />
only a platoon from the 609th) and that<br />
the 101st w<strong>as</strong> sending a rifle battalion<br />
within the half hour. Coincident with<br />
Roberts’ message the l<strong>as</strong>t of the German<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault force pulled back. Lauchert had<br />
decided that the ground w<strong>as</strong> too poor
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 453<br />
for tank maneuver, that reinforcements<br />
must be brought up for a headlong<br />
plunge. Meanwhile the German cannon-<br />
eers continued to pummel Noville. Deso-<br />
bry had many c<strong>as</strong>ualties, but several<br />
ambulances had been wrecked by shell-<br />
fire and it w<strong>as</strong> difficult to get the<br />
wounded out.<br />
The reinforcements reaching Desobry<br />
consisted of a platoon from the 705th<br />
Tank Destroyer Battalion (three com-<br />
panies of which constituted the only<br />
corps reserve Middleton had to give the<br />
101st Airborne) and the 1st Battalion<br />
(Lt. Col. James L. LaPrade) of the<br />
506th Parachute Infantry. Although Mc-<br />
Auliffe <strong>as</strong>signed the 506th the mission<br />
of covering the northern approaches to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne, the remaining two battalions<br />
had a string attached <strong>as</strong> the division re-<br />
serve, and the regimental commander,<br />
Colonel Sink, w<strong>as</strong> under strict orders not<br />
to move them from their positions just<br />
north of B<strong>as</strong>togne. As the paratroopers<br />
approached Noville, they came under<br />
heavy, well-aimed artillery fire, twenty<br />
to thirty rounds exploding on the village<br />
every ten minutes. Vehicles and build-<br />
ings were aflame-this w<strong>as</strong> indeed a hot<br />
corner, the village itself practically bare<br />
of life. Desobry’s detachment w<strong>as</strong> de-<br />
ployed south and west of the village; the<br />
Germans were firing from the north and<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, a more comfortable position since<br />
the higher ground encircling Noville<br />
tilted up on the enemy side of the dish.<br />
By 1430 the 1st Battalion w<strong>as</strong> ready<br />
to begin the <strong>as</strong>sault against the enemy-<br />
held high ground. The center company<br />
walked almost immediately into a rain<br />
of barrage fire and w<strong>as</strong> stopped with<br />
heavy losses. The two remaining com-<br />
panies were met with intense small arms<br />
fire but in fifteen minutes worked their<br />
way forward in short spurts to a point<br />
w<strong>here</strong> one l<strong>as</strong>t d<strong>as</strong>h would put them on<br />
the crest. As the paratroopers lay <strong>here</strong>,<br />
a m<strong>as</strong>s of green-clad figures suddenly<br />
erupted over the hill. Later the 1st Bat-<br />
talion estimated this attack w<strong>as</strong> carried<br />
by a rifle battalion backed by sixteen<br />
tanks. The American <strong>as</strong>sault had<br />
smacked headlong into the attack the 2d<br />
Panzer had been readying since mid-<br />
morning. As the fight spread, nearly<br />
thirty-two panzers were counted on the<br />
field. The two antagonists each reported<br />
subsequently that “the enemy counter-<br />
attack halted.” Both probably were cor-<br />
rect-although both continued to suffer<br />
heavy c<strong>as</strong>ualties. The German tanks<br />
might have decided the issue, but for<br />
over half an hour they stayed well back<br />
of the rifle line, perhaps fearful lest ba-<br />
zooka teams would reach them in the<br />
smoke and fog billowing up the hill,<br />
perhaps fearful of the bite in the few<br />
Shermans left. When a few of the enemy<br />
tanks finally ventured to approach, the<br />
American tank destroyers south of the<br />
village got on the flank of the panzers<br />
and put away five of them at 1,500-yards<br />
range.<br />
Now <strong>as</strong> the smoke and fog incre<strong>as</strong>ed,<br />
only small eddies broke the pall to give<br />
a few minutes of aimed fire. Two of the<br />
airborne companies fell back to the out-<br />
skirts of Noville while the third, on the<br />
hill to the e<strong>as</strong>t, waited for darkness to<br />
cover its withdrawal. At one juncture the<br />
1st Battalion w<strong>as</strong> under orders to leave<br />
Noville, but Brig. Gen. Gerald J. Hig-<br />
gins, the <strong>as</strong>sistant division commander<br />
who w<strong>as</strong> acting alter ego for McAuliffe,<br />
told the paratroopers to stay put and<br />
promised <strong>as</strong>sault gun and tank destroyer<br />
support for the morrow.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the Noville garrison the dark
454 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
hours were a nightmare. Every half hour<br />
a gust of enemy artillery fire shook the<br />
town; one shell cr<strong>as</strong>hed near the Amer-<br />
ican command post, killing LaPrade and<br />
wounding Desobry. Maj. Robert F. Har-<br />
wick, a paratrooper, <strong>as</strong>sumed over-all<br />
command, while Maj. Charles L. Hu-<br />
stead replaced Desobry <strong>as</strong> the armored<br />
team commander. (Desobry, with an<br />
agonizing head wound, w<strong>as</strong> placed in an<br />
ambulance headed for B<strong>as</strong>togne, but the<br />
ambulance w<strong>as</strong> captured en route.)<br />
Through the night the panzers prowled<br />
on the edge of the village and the Ger-<br />
man grenadiers came out of their fox-<br />
holes in abortive forays to reach the<br />
streets. But the paratroopers held the<br />
enemy at arm’s length and the enemy<br />
tankers showed little inclination to en-<br />
gage Hustead’s remaining eight Sher-<br />
mans, which had been brought into the<br />
village, in a blindfold duel.<br />
Earlier in the day the 101st command-<br />
er had planned to establish a defensive<br />
line running northwest to southe<strong>as</strong>t in<br />
front of B<strong>as</strong>togne from which the 501st,<br />
tied in with Desdbry and Cherry <strong>as</strong> flank<br />
guards, would launch a counterattack.<br />
The events of the 19th, <strong>as</strong> it turned out,<br />
showed how little room for maneuver<br />
w<strong>as</strong> left the Americans. Colonel Roberts,<br />
<strong>as</strong>sessing the reports from CCB in the<br />
early evening, advised McAuliffe that<br />
“right now the whole front is flat against<br />
this town [ B<strong>as</strong>togne] .” Roberts w<strong>as</strong><br />
right; nonetheless t<strong>here</strong> remained two<br />
indentations in the f<strong>as</strong>t-forming German<br />
line: the thumb sticking out at Noville<br />
and Team Ryerson’s little enclave on<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t edge of Mageret. The latter,<br />
however, disappeared during the night<br />
hours, for Ryerson, on orders, circled the<br />
enemy troops in Mageret and brought his<br />
depleted command into the lines of the<br />
501st at Bizory. (Ryerson later w<strong>as</strong> killed<br />
at B<strong>as</strong>togne.)<br />
General Luettwitz lacked the full Ger-<br />
man corps he craved to throw against<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne on the 20th. The 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division could count on only<br />
two of its regiments. Panzer Lehr had a<br />
substantial part of the division immedi-<br />
ately e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne, but at le<strong>as</strong>t one<br />
infantry regiment, much of its artillery,<br />
and the bulk of the division trains were<br />
still toiling along the gummy little roads<br />
–hardly more than trails—climbing west<br />
out of the Wiltz valley. Furthermore,<br />
Luettwitz had ordered Bayerlein to hold<br />
out a reserve for a d<strong>as</strong>h toward Sibret.<br />
The neighboring corps might lend<br />
Luettwitz a hand in the north–after all<br />
its 2d Panzer either had to break through<br />
at Noville or had to retrace its steps-<br />
but the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> commander<br />
had reiterated in no uncertain manner<br />
that Lauchert’s goal w<strong>as</strong> the Meuse, not<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The entire artillery complement of<br />
the 2d Panzer w<strong>as</strong> in place to support<br />
the attack at Noville when the 20th<br />
dawned. Lauchert’s armor w<strong>as</strong> in poor<br />
repair after the long and rough march.<br />
A goodly number of tanks had been shot<br />
up in the first day’s action at Noville, and<br />
the combination of muddy terrain and<br />
American antitank fire boded no good<br />
for a headlong armored <strong>as</strong>sault. Lauch-<br />
ert t<strong>here</strong>fore told his panzer grenadiers<br />
to carry the battle in company with small<br />
tank packets.<br />
While the German guns pl<strong>as</strong>tered the<br />
village the grenadiers moved in about<br />
0530 on three sides. Smoke and swirling<br />
fog veiled the attackers but the 420th<br />
Armored Field Artillery Battalion, firing<br />
from northwest of B<strong>as</strong>togne, laid down a<br />
protective curtain which held the enemy
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 455<br />
at bay for over an hour. The eight Sher-<br />
mans by this time had run out of armor-<br />
piercing ammunition and half a dozen<br />
panzers tried to close in. A fresh platoon<br />
of tank destroyers from the 705th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion, sent up by Higgins,<br />
took a hand and broke up this sortie.<br />
In midmorning, when a promised pla-<br />
toon of quad mount antiaircraft failed<br />
to appear, Harwick and Hustead learned<br />
that the enemy had cut the road to the<br />
rear. The two aid stations could handle<br />
no more wounded–most of the medics<br />
and aid men were c<strong>as</strong>ualties-and the<br />
enemy grip obviously w<strong>as</strong> tightening.<br />
The word relayed through the artillery<br />
net back to B<strong>as</strong>togne told the story: “All<br />
reserves committed. Situation critical.”<br />
McAuliffe and Roberts consulted,<br />
agreed that the Noville force should<br />
withdraw. <strong>To</strong> free the troops in Noville<br />
would take some doing. General Higgins,<br />
in charge of the northern sector, already<br />
had acted to meet this crisis by sending<br />
the 3d Battalion of the 502d Parachute<br />
Infantry (<strong>as</strong>sembled near Longchamps)<br />
into an attack northe<strong>as</strong>t against the Ger-<br />
mans who had descended on the road<br />
linking Noville and Foy. The latter vil-<br />
lage, 2,500 yards south of Noville on the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne road, had been occupied by the<br />
3d Battalion of the 506th, which had its<br />
own fight going. Foy lies at the bottom<br />
of a pocket and during the night ele-<br />
ments of the 304th Panzer Grenadier<br />
Regiment had wormed their way onto<br />
the hills overlooking the village from<br />
north, west, and e<strong>as</strong>t. With this vantage<br />
the Germans brought their direct fire<br />
weapons to bear and forced the 3d Bat-<br />
talion back onto the high ground south<br />
of the hamlet.<br />
But by noon the 101st had a solid<br />
b<strong>as</strong>e for a counterattack. The 2d Bat-<br />
talion of the 506th covered the right<br />
flank of the 3d and w<strong>as</strong> in contact with<br />
the 501st on the e<strong>as</strong>t. The battalion sent<br />
from the 502d w<strong>as</strong> in position west of<br />
Foy. Beginning the counterattack at<br />
1400, paratroopers pushed back through<br />
Foy and dug in some 200 yards to the<br />
north w<strong>here</strong> late in the afternoon they<br />
met the column fighting its way back<br />
from Noville. 5<br />
The smoke and fog that run through<br />
all reports of the Noville fight did good<br />
service <strong>as</strong> cover when the Americans<br />
formed for the march out. The main<br />
German barrier force had arrayed itself<br />
just north of Foy, complete with armor<br />
and self-propelled guns. Four Shermans,<br />
in the van with a few half-tracks, were<br />
put out of action before they could re-<br />
turn fire. While one paratroop company<br />
attacked to open the road, Major Har-<br />
wick sent for two tank destroyers from<br />
the rear of the column. Shells were burst-<br />
ing among the troops crouched by the<br />
roadside, and the clank of tank tracks<br />
could be heard approaching from No-<br />
ville. But the tank destroyers and their<br />
armor-piercing shell did the trick-and<br />
an <strong>as</strong>sist must be credited also to the<br />
Americans in Foy who were now on the<br />
enemy’s rear. By 1700 the column w<strong>as</strong><br />
back inside the American lines. The<br />
fight at Noville cost the 1st Battalion of<br />
the 506th a total of 13 officers and 199<br />
men killed, wounded, and missing.<br />
Team Desobry h<strong>as</strong> no record of its c<strong>as</strong>u-<br />
alties but they must have been very<br />
heavy, both in men and vehicles. The<br />
506th estimates that the 2d Panzer lost<br />
thirty-one vehicles in the Noville fight<br />
5 For bravery in this action Pfc. Gilbert Van<br />
Every w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.
456 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
and perhaps half a regiment of foot. At<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t the first part of this estimate may<br />
be close to the fact, for it is known that<br />
one battalion of the 3d Panzer Regiment<br />
w<strong>as</strong> badly crippled at Noville.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is an epilogue. In late afternoon,<br />
<strong>as</strong> his soldiers poked about the<br />
ruins of Noville, Lauchert radioed the<br />
LVIII Panzer Corps commander for permission<br />
to wheel the 2d Panzer into B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Krueger’s answer w<strong>as</strong> prompt and<br />
<strong>as</strong>tringent: “Forget B<strong>as</strong>togne and head<br />
for the Meuse!”<br />
The attack planned for the 19th e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne and carried out by the Panzer<br />
Lehr and 26th Volks Grenadier Divisions<br />
had signally failed of success. The<br />
soft ground had made it impossible for<br />
the German tanks to maneuver e<strong>as</strong>ily<br />
off the roads—a factor of great worth to<br />
the defenders. The Americans had at<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t five artillery battalions on call in<br />
this sector, w<strong>here</strong><strong>as</strong> neither of the two<br />
enemy divisions had been able to get<br />
any substantial number of guns and<br />
howitzers forward. Also, the pell-mell,<br />
piecemeal deployment e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
by the advance guard formations w<strong>as</strong> beginning<br />
to reap a harvest of delay and<br />
tactical confusion. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> some savage<br />
fighting <strong>here</strong> during the day, but<br />
un-co-ordinated—on the part of the enemy-and<br />
never pressed in force to a<br />
definite conclusion.<br />
On the 20th Luettwitz turned the<br />
78th Volks Grenadier Regiment over to<br />
the Panzer Lehr commander for the<br />
close-in northern hook at B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
planned for execution the previous day.<br />
The immediate goal w<strong>as</strong> Luzery, a suburb<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne on the Houffalize highway.<br />
The 78th circled north to p<strong>as</strong>s the<br />
village of Bizory, the left wing pin for<br />
the 501st, but fire from Company F<br />
caught the Germans in the flank. This<br />
halted the move and forced the 78th to<br />
swing wide into the cover given by the<br />
woods north of the village. M<strong>as</strong>ked by<br />
the woods the enemy proceeded west <strong>as</strong><br />
far <strong>as</strong> the Bourcy-B<strong>as</strong>togne rail line,<br />
then unaccountably stopped. When the<br />
2d Battalion of the 506th came up on the<br />
left of the 501st, its disposition w<strong>as</strong> such<br />
that it faced this German force, plus its<br />
sister regiment the 77th, at the point<br />
w<strong>here</strong> the Foy-Bizory road crossed the<br />
railroad.<br />
Through most of the daylight hours<br />
on the 20th the enemy seemed content<br />
to probe the main line occupied by the<br />
501st. During the evening Bayerlein sent<br />
his own 902d Panzer Grenadier Regi-<br />
ment against Neffe, but a roving patrol<br />
from Team O’Hara happened to spot<br />
the tank detachment of the regiment <strong>as</strong><br />
it filed along the Neffe-Wardin road and<br />
brought friendly artillery into play. Be-<br />
tween the American gunners and para-<br />
troopers the 902d took a formidable<br />
beating–very severe c<strong>as</strong>ualties were re-<br />
ported by the enemy division comman-<br />
der. A tank destroyer platoon from the<br />
705th used ground flares to sight and<br />
destroy three of the panzers reinforcing<br />
the infantry <strong>as</strong>sault waves.<br />
When the 501st went into position on<br />
the 19th, its southern flank had been<br />
none too solidly anchored by the thin<br />
counterreconnaissance screen operated<br />
by T<strong>as</strong>k Force O’Hara and the tired,<br />
understrength 35th Engineer Combat<br />
Battalion (Lt. Col. Paul H. Symbol).<br />
Enemy pressure around Wardin, al-<br />
though subsequently relaxed, indicated<br />
that <strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a gap which had better be<br />
sealed. On the morning of the 20th Mc-<br />
Auliffe sent the 2d Battalion of the 327th<br />
Glider Infantry from the division <strong>as</strong>sem-
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 457<br />
bly area through B<strong>as</strong>togne to relieve<br />
Company A of the engineers. 6<br />
The engineers had just climbed out<br />
of their foxhole line west of Marvie and<br />
turned the position over to the 2d Bat-<br />
talion when one of O’Hara’s outposts<br />
saw a German column streaming into<br />
Marvie. This w<strong>as</strong> the advance guard of<br />
the 901st Regiment which had finally<br />
extricated itself from the Wiltz valley.<br />
With only a single rifle company and<br />
four tanks, the Germans never had a<br />
chance. In an hour’s time O’Hara’s me-<br />
diums had accounted for the panzers and<br />
the 2d Battalion had beaten the attackers<br />
back in disorder and occupied Marvie.<br />
The paratroopers waited through the<br />
day for the main attack to come, but the<br />
only evidences of the enemy were a<br />
smoke screen drifting in from the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
and occ<strong>as</strong>ional tanks in the distance. Un-<br />
known to the Americans a shift in the<br />
Panzer Lehr’s stance before B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
w<strong>as</strong> taking place.<br />
The inchoate American defense form-<br />
ing at B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>as</strong> conditioned by a set<br />
of optimistic premises. The first of these<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the promised arrival of the 4th Ar-<br />
mored Division from Patton’s Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> in the south. During the night of<br />
19 December the VIII Corps commander,<br />
acting on word from Patton, told Mc-<br />
Auliffe that one combat command from<br />
the 4th Armored w<strong>as</strong> on its way to B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne and would be attached to the<br />
101st. At noon McAuliffe and Roberts<br />
(who had been promised this initial<br />
4th Armored force) learned that the en-<br />
tire division w<strong>as</strong> to be added to the B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
6 It is indicative of the confusion and lack of<br />
precise information then current that the 2d<br />
Battalion journal reports, <strong>as</strong> if in surprise, that no<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties were sustained during this move.<br />
togne defense. The certainty of the 4th<br />
Armored’s appearance explains in part<br />
the routine and rather cavalier treat-<br />
ment accorded Capt. Bert Ezell and his<br />
little team from CCB, 4th Armored,<br />
when it arrived in B<strong>as</strong>togne shortly after<br />
noon. 7 Quite obviously McAuliffe and<br />
Middleton anticipated the early appear-<br />
ance of the entire armored division.<br />
A second premise–accepted in most<br />
of the 101st planning efforts on 20 De-<br />
cember-w<strong>as</strong> that the VIII Corps still<br />
had viable forces in and around B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
which could be employed in common<br />
with the airborne divisions. This idea,<br />
of course, went hand in hand with the<br />
very real ignorance of enemy forces<br />
and locations which obtained both in<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne and at Middleton’s new head-<br />
quarters in Neufchâteau. Earlier Mc-<br />
Auliffe and his staff had counted on<br />
Roberts’ 10th Armored combat com-<br />
mand to reinforce a counterattack<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t by the 101st—a vain expectation, <strong>as</strong><br />
it turned out. T<strong>here</strong> remained the 28th<br />
Infantry Division—or at le<strong>as</strong>t some part<br />
t<strong>here</strong>of. In midafternoon McAuliffe sent<br />
a liaison officer to General Cota, whose<br />
headquarters w<strong>as</strong> now at Sibret south-<br />
west of B<strong>as</strong>togne, with instructions to<br />
find out the German dispositions and<br />
to <strong>as</strong>k the question: “Could the 28th at-<br />
tack towards Wiltz in conjunction with<br />
the 101st Airborne tomorrow?”<br />
Cota’s reply is not even recorded in<br />
the 101st Airborne log. After all he<br />
could give only one answer: the 28th<br />
Infantry Division no longer existed<br />
<strong>as</strong> a division (although two of its regi-<br />
ments would continue in stubborn bat-<br />
7 Ezell’s excursion is treated with the 4th<br />
Armored story in Chapter XXI. The news of<br />
Ezell’s subsequent departure from B<strong>as</strong>togne is<br />
reflected only in scant journal notations.
458 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tle under other commands). The fall<br />
of Wiltz on the night of 19 December<br />
had written finis to the story of the<br />
110th Infantry, Cota’s single remaining<br />
regiment. On the morning of the 20th<br />
Cota had gone into B<strong>as</strong>togne, finding<br />
its streets jammed with vehicles, corps<br />
artillery trying to bull a way through,<br />
and a host of stragglers, including many<br />
of the survivors of the 110th Infantry.<br />
General Middleton gave Cota permis-<br />
sion to get his people out of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
and the latter ordered them out on foot,<br />
abandoning to the traffic jam those ve-<br />
hicles still in their possession. (So im-<br />
pressed w<strong>as</strong> General Cota by the traffic<br />
choking the streets and alleys of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne, that he advised the VIII Corps<br />
commander to keep all contingents of<br />
the 4th Armored Division out of the<br />
town.)<br />
Despite McAuliffe’s failure to secure<br />
the immediate <strong>as</strong>sistance which would<br />
make a full-bodied counterattack fe<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ible, it seemed that the tactical problem<br />
facing the 101st on the evening of 20<br />
December remained linear, that is, the<br />
creation of a homogeneous and defen-<br />
sible line barring entrance to B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
from the north and e<strong>as</strong>t. The corps let-<br />
ter of instructions reaching McAuliffe<br />
at noon on the 20th w<strong>as</strong> rather more<br />
sweeping in its definition of mission.<br />
“T<strong>here</strong> will be no withdrawal”—this<br />
w<strong>as</strong> clear enough to all concerned. “The<br />
[ 101st Airborne] Division will stabilize<br />
their front lines on the front P798945<br />
[that is, Recht] to St. Vith, south along<br />
a general line e<strong>as</strong>t of [Highway] N15<br />
. . . to connect with the 4th Infantry<br />
Division at Breitweiler.” It may be <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sumed that neither Middleton nor Mc-<br />
Auliffe took this part of the order either<br />
literally or seriously.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> had been a few indications,<br />
and rumors, of enemy activity west of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne–indeed the 101st had lost<br />
some of its trains in the division <strong>as</strong>sem-<br />
bly area during the previous night–but<br />
thus far all this could be charged to<br />
raiding parties roaming on the loose un-<br />
der cover of night in a fluid and chang-<br />
ing battle. In early evening a report<br />
reached B<strong>as</strong>togne that the road north-<br />
west to La Roche and Ortheuville<br />
(w<strong>here</strong> two platoons of the 705th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion now attached to the<br />
101st were operating) w<strong>as</strong> free of the<br />
enemy. The roads south to Neufchâteau<br />
and Arlon were still open–and waiting<br />
for traverse by the 4th Armored. So the<br />
situation looked in McAuliffe’s B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
headquarters at 1900 on 20 December.<br />
Across the lines the German com-<br />
mander, Luettwitz, w<strong>as</strong> none too ple<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
by the rather dilatory operations of his<br />
corps. He knew by this time that the<br />
American front e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne had<br />
stiffened and that his troops had been<br />
able to find no holes. On the other hand<br />
the strength of his corps w<strong>as</strong> incre<strong>as</strong>ing<br />
by the hour <strong>as</strong> the two divisions hauled<br />
their tails up on the muddy roads–it<br />
looked <strong>as</strong> though he had the forces<br />
needed for maneuver. As a l<strong>as</strong>t flick of<br />
the hand Luettwitz ordered Bayerlein to<br />
throw the 902d into the night attack<br />
against Neffe. This w<strong>as</strong> at most a diver-<br />
sion, for Luettwitz had decided to envel-<br />
ope B<strong>as</strong>togne from the south and west.<br />
He intended to use the bulk of the Pan-<br />
zer Lehr, leaving only one of its grena-<br />
dier regiments to flesh out the e<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
front with the foot elements of Kokott’s<br />
26th Volks Grenadier Division, but in<br />
addition he had in hand the 39th Volks<br />
Grenadier Regiment of the 26th which<br />
had just come up behind the corps’
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 459<br />
south flank. All told t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a sizable<br />
motorized force for this venture: the re-<br />
inforced reconnaissance battalion, the<br />
engineer battalion, and the 902d (<strong>as</strong><br />
soon <strong>as</strong> it could be disengaged) from the<br />
Panzer Lehr; plus the reconnaissance<br />
battalion and 39th from the 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division.<br />
The immediate objectives seem to<br />
have been clearly stated. The Panzer<br />
Lehr spearheads were to advance via<br />
Hompré and Sibret to St. Hubert, while<br />
the units of the 26th would start the<br />
attack from an <strong>as</strong>sembly point at Remon-<br />
fosse on the B<strong>as</strong>togne-Arlon road with<br />
the intention of stabbing into B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
from the southwest. In fact this night<br />
operation developed into a mad scram-<br />
ble in which the troops from the two<br />
divisions jockeyed for the lead <strong>as</strong> if they<br />
were in a flat race for high stakes.<br />
Truly the stakes were high. Through-<br />
out this maneuver Luettwitz and his<br />
superior, General Manteuffel, had an<br />
eye single to shaking the armored col-<br />
umns of the XLVII Panzer Corps free<br />
for the d<strong>as</strong>h to the Meuse bridges. B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne, sitting in the center of the web of<br />
hard-surfaced roads, w<strong>as</strong> important–but<br />
only <strong>as</strong> a means to a geographically dis-<br />
tant end. B<strong>as</strong>togne had failed to fall like<br />
an overripe plum when the bough w<strong>as</strong><br />
shaken, but it could be clipped off the<br />
branch—or so the German High Com-<br />
mand still re<strong>as</strong>oned—and without using<br />
Bayerlein’s armor.<br />
The enemy drive across the south<br />
face of B<strong>as</strong>togne and on to the west dur-<br />
ing the night of 20 December did not<br />
immediately jolt McAuliffe’s command;<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> rather a disparate series of cl<strong>as</strong>hes<br />
with scattered and unsuspecting units of<br />
the VIII Corps. Central to the story at<br />
this point is the fact that by daylight on<br />
the 21st the German infantry following<br />
the armored troops were ensconced on<br />
both the main roads running from B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne south, while light forces were<br />
running up and down the western<br />
reaches of the B<strong>as</strong>togne–St. Hubert high-<br />
way. In the north the circle had been<br />
clamped shut during the night when the<br />
2d Panzer seized Ortheuville on the<br />
Marche road.<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne Is Encircled<br />
Some of the B<strong>as</strong>togne defenders re-<br />
call in the saga of the 101st Airborne<br />
Division that their lone fight began on<br />
20 December. “It w<strong>as</strong> on this day, 20<br />
December,” reads the war diary of the<br />
327th Glider Infantry, “that all roads<br />
were cut by the enemy . . . and we were<br />
completely surrounded.” This is only<br />
hindsight. The picture of complete en-<br />
circlement w<strong>as</strong> built up in McAuliffe’s<br />
headquarters only slowly on the 21st, nor<br />
did the ring at first seem to be hermetic<br />
and contracting. Doubtless the word<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed among the regiments very rap-<br />
idly-the 501st journal notes at 1030 that<br />
the l<strong>as</strong>t road is cut–but it w<strong>as</strong> late after-<br />
noon before an armored patrol sent out<br />
by CCB affirmed that the way south cer-<br />
tainly w<strong>as</strong> closed.<br />
What were the means available for<br />
defense of the B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter? The<br />
101st Airborne w<strong>as</strong> an elite, veteran<br />
outfit at nearly full strength, and well<br />
acquainted with isolation <strong>as</strong> a combat<br />
formation. Only five battalions from<br />
McAuliffe’s four regiments had been<br />
seriously engaged in the fight thus far.<br />
Its four artillery battalions were rein-<br />
forced by the 969th and 755th Field<br />
Artillery Battalions, armed with 155-<br />
mm. howitzers whose range w<strong>as</strong> nearly
460 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
three times that of the airborne artillery,<br />
a very important make-weight for the<br />
101st. In addition the 10th Armored<br />
Troops were supported by the 420th<br />
Armored Field Artillery Battalion,<br />
whose mobility and tactics made it espe-<br />
cially useful in a perimeter situation.<br />
Also available were stray gun sections<br />
and pieces from artillery units which<br />
had been decimated during the VIII<br />
Corps’ withdrawal.<br />
Probably CCB, 10th Armored, and<br />
CCR, 9th Armored, had between them<br />
some forty operable medium tanks by<br />
the 21st. 8 <strong>To</strong> this number of fighting<br />
vehicles should be added the light tanks,<br />
cavalry <strong>as</strong>sault guns, and antiaircraft ar-<br />
tillery automatic weapons carriers—<br />
probably no more than two platoons in<br />
each category. A very heartening addi-<br />
tion to the B<strong>as</strong>togne force, of course, w<strong>as</strong><br />
provided by the 705th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion.<br />
The highway nodal position which<br />
made B<strong>as</strong>togne so necessary to the Ger-<br />
mans also set up a magnetic field for<br />
the heterogeneous stragglers, broken in-<br />
fantry, and dismounted tankers heading<br />
west. Realizing this fact, Colonel Rob-<br />
berts got permission to gather all<br />
stragglers into his command. Roberts’<br />
force came to be known <strong>as</strong> Team<br />
SNAFU 9 and served mainly <strong>as</strong> a reser-<br />
voir from which regular units drew<br />
replacements or from which com-<br />
manders organized t<strong>as</strong>k forces for special<br />
<strong>as</strong>signments.<br />
8 The records of the badly fragmented armor<br />
absorbed in the lines of the 101st Airborne are<br />
so scanty <strong>as</strong> to give no really precise strength<br />
figures.<br />
9 In the vernacular of the time, SNAFU stood<br />
for: Situation Normal, All Fouled Up. Thus<br />
Team SNAFU w<strong>as</strong> named in a typical soldier<br />
cock of the snoot at adverse fate and the sensi-<br />
bilities of higher command.<br />
It is impossible to reckon accurately<br />
the number and the fighting worth of<br />
those stragglers who reached B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
and stayed t<strong>here</strong>. CCR contributed<br />
about two hundred riflemen; CCB may<br />
have had an equal number; General<br />
Cota culled two or three hundred men<br />
from Team SNAFU to return to his 28th<br />
Division; and one may guess t<strong>here</strong> were<br />
another two or three hundred stragglers<br />
whose identity h<strong>as</strong> been lost. Many of<br />
these men, given a hot meal and forty-<br />
eight hours’ rest, could be used and were<br />
used, but they appear <strong>as</strong> anonymous<br />
figures in the combat record (thus:<br />
“100 infantry left for Team Browne”) .<br />
McAuliffe now had the advantage of<br />
a clearly defined command structure.<br />
Before the 20th he and Colonel Roberts<br />
had commanded independently, but on<br />
that date Middleton gave McAuliffe the<br />
“say” (<strong>as</strong> General Cota had advised after<br />
his visit) over all the troops in the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne sector. 10 The presence of Rob-<br />
erts would prove particularly valuable.<br />
Early in the war he had been the ar-<br />
mored instructor at the <strong>Army</strong> Command<br />
and General Staff School, w<strong>here</strong> his<br />
humorously illustrated “Do’s” and<br />
“Don’ts” of tank warfare showed a keen<br />
appreciation of the problems posed by<br />
armor and infantry co-operation. The<br />
paratroopers were in particular need of<br />
this advice for they seldom worked with<br />
armor, knew little of its capability, and<br />
even less of its limitations, and–<strong>as</strong> be-<br />
fitted troops who jumped into thin air–<br />
were a little contemptuous of men who<br />
fought behind plate steel. (During the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne battle Roberts developed a<br />
formal memorandum on the proper em-<br />
ployment of armor, but this w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
10 General McAuliffe subsequently w<strong>as</strong> given the<br />
DSC for the defense of the town.
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE<br />
distributed to the 101st until 28 De-<br />
cember.) On the other hand the tankers<br />
had much to learn from commanders<br />
and troops who were used to fighting<br />
“surrounded.”<br />
McAuliffe’s logistic means were less<br />
substantial than the tactical. The air-<br />
borne division normally carried less sup-<br />
ply than conventional divisions and the<br />
101st had been hurried into Belgium<br />
with ammunition and grenade pouches<br />
not quite full, much individual equip-<br />
ment missing (overshoes, helmets, sleep-<br />
ing bags, and the like), and only a few<br />
truckloads of 105-mm. howitzer shells.<br />
In fact some of the first paratroopers in-<br />
to line had to be supplied with ammu-<br />
nition from the CCB trains. Fortunately<br />
Roberts’ trains were full, and in some<br />
major supply items even had overages,<br />
when they arrived at B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The ability of the 101st to sustain it-<br />
self had been severely diminished on the<br />
night of 19 December when German<br />
raiding parties (some reported in civil-<br />
ian garb) surprised and overran the<br />
division service area around Mande-St.<br />
Etienne. Most of the quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter and<br />
ordnance troops made their way to the<br />
VIII Corps, but the raiders captured or<br />
killed most of the division medical<br />
company. Only eight officers and forty-<br />
four men escaped. This loss of doctors,<br />
aid men, and medical supplies w<strong>as</strong> one<br />
of the most severe blows dealt the 101st.<br />
A number of transport vehicles also were<br />
lost in this affray, but about a hundred<br />
trucks had been sent to the rear for re-<br />
supply and so escaped. Very few of these<br />
got back to the 101st before the ring<br />
closed.<br />
In addition, Roberts had sent the<br />
CCB trucks back for resupply just be-<br />
fore the roads were closed. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong>,<br />
461<br />
of course, a considerable quantity of am-<br />
munition, food, and other supplies in-<br />
side B<strong>as</strong>togne which the VIII Corps had<br />
been unable to evacuate. (<strong>Of</strong>ficers of<br />
Middleton’s staff bitterly regretted the<br />
loss of the wine and liquors which had<br />
been carefully husbanded for consump-<br />
tion at Christm<strong>as</strong> and New Year). B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne w<strong>as</strong> sizable enough to have some<br />
reserve civilian stocks, and the mélange<br />
of armor, engineers, and artillery units<br />
around the city had supplies and ammu-<br />
nition in their own vehicles. (Pancakes<br />
would appear regularly in the rations<br />
served during the siege, these concocted<br />
from the doughnut flour left in a huge<br />
American Red Cross dump.)<br />
Through <strong>as</strong>siduous scrounging, req-<br />
uisitioning, and an enforced pooling of<br />
unit resources, the G–4 of the 101st<br />
would be able to work minor logistic<br />
miracles-but these alone would not<br />
have insured the survival of the B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne garrision. The airborne division<br />
had been supplied by air during the<br />
Holland operation, and when, on the<br />
21st, McAuliffe knew that his command<br />
w<strong>as</strong> isolated he <strong>as</strong>ked for aerial re-<br />
supply. Unfortunately no plans had<br />
been worked out in advance for air-<br />
lift support and the supply records of<br />
the Holland campaign-which would<br />
have made logistic calculation and pro-<br />
cedure e<strong>as</strong>ier-were back in France. In<br />
the first instance, t<strong>here</strong>fore, the troops<br />
in B<strong>as</strong>togne would have to take what<br />
they got whenever they could get it.<br />
Communications would present no<br />
major problem. A corps radio-link ve-<br />
hicle arrived in B<strong>as</strong>togne just before the<br />
road to Neufchâteau w<strong>as</strong> severed; so<br />
Middleton and McAuliffe had two-way<br />
phone and teletype at their disposal<br />
throughout the siege. Inside B<strong>as</strong>togne
462 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
t<strong>here</strong> were enough armored and artil-<br />
lery units–comparatively rich in signal<br />
equipment-to flesh out a speedy and<br />
fairly reliable command and artillery<br />
net. Tactical communication beyond the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter, however, <strong>as</strong> for ex-<br />
ample with the 4th Armored, had to be<br />
couched in ambiguous-sometimes quite<br />
meaningless-terms.<br />
Mobile forces racing cross-country,<br />
shooting up isolated posts and convoys,<br />
do not necessarily make a battle. The<br />
German d<strong>as</strong>h around B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>as</strong> pre-<br />
eminently designed to encircle, not con-<br />
strict. The German commanders, well<br />
aware of the fragmentization of their en-<br />
veloping forces, did not consider that<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne had been surrounded until the<br />
evening of the 21st. The major enemy<br />
impact on this date, t<strong>here</strong>fore, came <strong>as</strong><br />
in previous days against the e<strong>as</strong>t face of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. The American perimeter,<br />
then taking form, represents b<strong>as</strong>ically a<br />
reaction to the original German inten-<br />
tions with only slight concessions to the<br />
appearance of the enemy in the south<br />
and west. The 502d held the northern<br />
sector of the American line in the Long-<br />
champs and Sonne-Fontaine area. North-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne the 506th w<strong>as</strong> deployed<br />
with one foot in Foy and the other<br />
next to the Bourcy-B<strong>as</strong>togne rail line.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the right of this regiment the<br />
501st faced e<strong>as</strong>t-one flank at the rail line<br />
and the other south of Neffe. The 2d<br />
Battalion, 327th, held the Marvie posi-<br />
tion with an open flank abutting on the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne-Arlon highway.<br />
The American deployment on<br />
through the south and west quadrants<br />
could not yet be called a line. In the<br />
early afternoon McAuliffe took the 1st<br />
Battalion of the 327th (then attached to<br />
the 501st) and sent it due south of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne; <strong>here</strong> tenuous contact w<strong>as</strong> estab-<br />
lished with the division engineer battal-<br />
ion-the 326th-strung thinly across the<br />
Neufchâteau road and on to the west.<br />
(The airborne engineers were not well<br />
equipped with demolition matériel and<br />
this road had to be blocked; McAuliffe<br />
phoned the VIII Corps for <strong>as</strong>sistance<br />
and in the early dark a detachment from<br />
the 35th Engineer Combat Battalion<br />
came north and did the job.)<br />
Directly west of B<strong>as</strong>togne lay the rem-<br />
nants of the division trains and service<br />
companies. Defense <strong>here</strong> would devolve<br />
initially on the 420th Armored Field<br />
Artillery Battalion (Lt. Col. Barry D.<br />
Browne) , which w<strong>as</strong> gathering infantry<br />
and tank destroyers and finally would<br />
be known <strong>as</strong> T<strong>as</strong>k Force Browne. The<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t link in the perimeter w<strong>as</strong> the 3d<br />
Battalion of the 327th, holding on a<br />
front northwest of B<strong>as</strong>togne which ex-<br />
tended from the Marche-B<strong>as</strong>togne high-<br />
way to Champs.<br />
The dispositions just described repre-<br />
sent the more or less static formations<br />
in the B<strong>as</strong>togne force, the beef for<br />
sustained holding operations. Equally<br />
important were the mobile, counter-<br />
punching elements provided by the ar-<br />
mor, <strong>as</strong>sault guns, and tank destroyers.<br />
These units, with constantly changing<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force names and composition, would<br />
have a ubiquitous, fluid, and highly im-<br />
portant role in maintaining the B<strong>as</strong>tog-<br />
ne perimeter against the German con-<br />
centric attack. Their tactical agility on<br />
the interior line would be greatly en-<br />
hanced by the big freeze which set in on<br />
the 21st.<br />
All through the night of 20 December<br />
the troops of the 506th in Foy had been
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE<br />
buffeted by German artillery. At dawn<br />
the enemy advanced on the village, and<br />
the Americans, <strong>as</strong> they had done earlier,<br />
retired to the better ground south of<br />
Foy and Recogne. This early effort w<strong>as</strong><br />
not followed up because the 2d Panzer<br />
w<strong>as</strong> on its way west and had no further<br />
concern in this sector save to neutralize<br />
a possible American foray against its<br />
rear.<br />
The primary attack of the day came<br />
along the Bourcy-B<strong>as</strong>togne rail line,<br />
right at the seam between the 506th and<br />
501st. During the previous night Kokott<br />
had built up the concentration of his<br />
26th Volks Grenadier Division in the<br />
woods e<strong>as</strong>t of the railroad to include<br />
much of the rifle strength of the 77th<br />
and 78th Regiments. The two Amer-<br />
ican regiments had failed to make a<br />
firm commitment <strong>as</strong> to tactical respon-<br />
sibility and, indeed, the left flank of the<br />
501st w<strong>as</strong> nearly a thousand yards to<br />
the rear of the 506th. At 0830 a 506th<br />
patrol chanced upon some Germans in<br />
the woods behind the regiment’s right<br />
flank. Companies D and F attacked<br />
promptly to seal the gap at the rail line<br />
while the 501st turned its weapons to<br />
deny any movement on its side.<br />
Enough of the enemy had infiltrated<br />
for McAuliffe to <strong>as</strong>k Colonel Sink to<br />
send in his 1st Battalion, which had been<br />
badly hurt at Noville, <strong>as</strong> a cauterizing<br />
force. It took three hours of musketry<br />
and, at several points, bayonet work to<br />
liquidate the Germans in the pocket;<br />
the battalion killed about 50, took pris-<br />
oner 85, and drove a large number into<br />
the hands of the 501st. This hot sec-<br />
tor of the front cooled off during the<br />
afternoon. The 26th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> realigning and extending<br />
to take over the ground vacated by<br />
463<br />
Panzer Lehr, and Kokott could not af-<br />
ford two regiments in attack at the rail<br />
line.<br />
Through most of 21 December the<br />
Germans l<strong>as</strong>hed out at the 501st with<br />
artillery and sporadic infantry <strong>as</strong>saults.<br />
On the American left flank Kokott’s<br />
77th carried the ball but the main effort<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made by the 902d, attacking from<br />
an <strong>as</strong>sembly area at Neffe against the<br />
3d Battalion. The records of this bat-<br />
talion were lost in later fighting, but<br />
participants in the action speak of a<br />
“determined” attack by two German<br />
rifle battalions and “vicious close-in<br />
fighting.” Although Colonel Ewell ex-<br />
pected a second all-out <strong>as</strong>sault when day-<br />
light ended, this never came. The 902d<br />
had its orders to catch up with the Pan-<br />
zer Lehr van in the west and during the<br />
night <strong>as</strong>sembled for the march to rejoin<br />
General Bayerlein.<br />
South of the 501st positions the enemy<br />
seemed content to sit back and shell<br />
the headquarters of the 2d Battalion,<br />
327th, at Marvie. The 2d Battalion re-<br />
cords no other action than the appear-<br />
ance of some tanks and infantry along<br />
the Arlon road forcing a flank exten-<br />
sion across the road. German evidence,<br />
however, speaks of attacks by the 901st<br />
in this sector which “miscarried.” 11 If<br />
discretion in this particular instance<br />
proved the better part of valor, it prob-<br />
ably w<strong>as</strong> induced by the CCB tanks<br />
which had taken position on the Arlon<br />
road.<br />
Farther west the enemy w<strong>as</strong> more ag-<br />
gressive. Having played havoc with the<br />
11 Both the German and American records for<br />
the Ardennes contain, from time to time, reports<br />
of “attacks” which in fact were never noticed by<br />
the alleged targets and which probably were no<br />
more than dutiful commotion in response to the<br />
promptings of higher authority.
464 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
VIII Corps’ artillery and trains <strong>as</strong>sem-<br />
bled outside Sibret, Kumpfgruppe<br />
Kunkel turned north in the late morn-<br />
ing toward Senonchamps, a village of<br />
some importance since it controlled the<br />
secondary road leading onto the Marche-<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne highway. The immediate prize<br />
before Kunkel, but probably unknown<br />
to him, w<strong>as</strong> the American artillery<br />
groupment consisting of the 755th and<br />
969th Field Artillery Battalions, em-<br />
placed with their 155-mm. howitzers<br />
near Villeroux, a crossroads some 2,500<br />
yards south of Senonchamps.<br />
At Senonchamps the 420th Armored<br />
Field Artillery Battalion under Colonel<br />
Browne w<strong>as</strong> busily engaged in firing<br />
against the enemy e<strong>as</strong>t and north of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne, but Browne had been able to take<br />
some steps to secure his gun positions<br />
with a scratch force of infantry and<br />
light tanks raised by CCB. Around Vil-<br />
leroux, however, all w<strong>as</strong> confusion and<br />
no single officer seemed to be respon-<br />
sible for defense of this sector. As Kun-<br />
kel sped north from Sibret toward Vil-<br />
leroux he met the 771st Field Artillery<br />
Battalion, which abandoned its guns and<br />
fled. About this time Team Pyle (a de-<br />
tachment formed from the remnants of<br />
CCR and numbering fourteen tanks and<br />
a couple of hundred stray riflemen)<br />
came south on the Neufchâteau road.<br />
Kunkel hit the point of this force e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Villeroux and drove the Americans<br />
back in the direction of Senonchamps.<br />
The brief respite given the Villeroux<br />
defenders by this encounter enabled the<br />
two medium howitzer battalions to<br />
“march order” their batteries and head<br />
for Senonchamps. German infantry in<br />
half-tracks closed on Villeroux before<br />
the l<strong>as</strong>t howitzers could displace, but<br />
visibility by this time had dwindled to<br />
a couple of hundred yards and Battery<br />
A of the 755th alongside the headquar-<br />
ters battery of the 969th laid down a<br />
hail of machine gun fire which momen-<br />
tarily halted the enemy. This small rear<br />
guard force itself w<strong>as</strong> saved by the ap-<br />
pearance of two American tanks that<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ually wandered into the fight and out<br />
again. Only one howitzer w<strong>as</strong> lost dur-<br />
ing the displacement to Senonchamps,<br />
and it w<strong>as</strong> disabled by a mortar shell.<br />
At the edge of Senonchamps Team<br />
Pyle made a stand, for the German drive<br />
threatened to strike the 420th Ar-<br />
mored Field Artillery Battalion (Team<br />
Browne) and the two battalions of 155’s<br />
from the rear. When the enemy infantry<br />
formed to join their tanks in an <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
on the village they came directly under<br />
the eyes of Battery B of the 796th Anti-<br />
aircraft Artillery Battalion, whose .50-<br />
caliber “meat choppers” quickly ended<br />
this threat. Kunkel decided to delay an<br />
attempt for conclusion until the mor-<br />
row.<br />
North and northwest of B<strong>as</strong>togne the<br />
day p<strong>as</strong>sed quietly, although small Ger-<br />
man detachments did make a few sorties<br />
on the Marche road. The company of<br />
the 3d Battalion, 327th, which had been<br />
sent on a lone mission to aid the sur-<br />
vivors of the division medical company,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> attacked and momentarily cut off but<br />
succeeded in rejoining the battalion.<br />
The Enemy Begins a Concentric<br />
Attack<br />
The evening situation report that<br />
reached OB WEST on the 21st made<br />
good reading. Rundstedt w<strong>as</strong> convinced<br />
that the time w<strong>as</strong> ripe for a concentric<br />
attack to crush B<strong>as</strong>togne and make this<br />
road center available for the build-up re-
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE<br />
quired to support the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
at or over the Meuse. His order to Man-<br />
teuffel made the seizure of B<strong>as</strong>togne a<br />
must, but at the same time stressed<br />
the paramount necessity of retaining<br />
momentum in the drive west. Manteuf-<br />
fel had anticipated the OB WEST<br />
command and during the evening visited<br />
the XLVII Panzer Corps’ command<br />
post to make certain that Luettwitz<br />
would start the squeeze on B<strong>as</strong>togne the<br />
next day-but without involving the<br />
mobile armored columns of the Panzer<br />
Lehr.<br />
Manteuffel, Luettwitz, and Kokott,<br />
who w<strong>as</strong> now made directly responsible<br />
for the conduct of the B<strong>as</strong>togne opera-<br />
tion, were optimistic. For one thing the<br />
fight could be made without looking<br />
over the shoulder toward the south<br />
(w<strong>here</strong> the Luftwaffe had reported<br />
heavy American traffic moving from<br />
Metz through Luxembourg City), be-<br />
cause the right wing of the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> finally had shouldered its way<br />
west and seemed ready to take over the<br />
prearranged blocking line facing Neuf-<br />
château, Arlon, and the American rein-<br />
forcements predicted from Patton’s<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong>. The advance guard of the<br />
5th Parachute Division already had<br />
crossed the Arlon road north of Marte-<br />
lange. General Brandenberger, the Sev-<br />
enth <strong>Army</strong> commander, himself came to<br />
Luettwitz’ command post during the<br />
evening to promise that all three regi-<br />
ments of the division would take their<br />
allotted positions.<br />
Kokott apparently w<strong>as</strong> promised rein-<br />
forcement for the attack à outrance on<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne but he had to begin the bat-<br />
tle with those troops on the spot: his<br />
own 26th Volks Grenadier Division, the<br />
901st Kampfgruppe (which had been<br />
465<br />
detached from Panzer Lehr), an extra<br />
fifteen Panther tanks, and some artil-<br />
lery battalions. What the 5th Parachute<br />
Division could put into the pot depend-<br />
ed, of course, on the Americans to the<br />
south.<br />
It would take some time to relieve<br />
those troops pulling out and redress the<br />
alignment of the 26th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division’s battalions. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little<br />
point to attacking the 101st Airborne in<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>tern sector w<strong>here</strong> its strength<br />
had been demonstrated, but west of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne the Panzer Lehr and Kokott’s own<br />
reconnaissance troops had encountered<br />
only weak and disorganized opposition.<br />
The first blow of the new series designed<br />
to bore into B<strong>as</strong>togne would be de-<br />
livered <strong>here</strong> in the western sector,<br />
accompanied by systematic shelling to<br />
bring that town down around the<br />
defender’s ears.<br />
The battle on the 22d, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
largely centered along an arc rather<br />
roughly delimited by Villeroux and the<br />
Neufchâteau highway at one end and<br />
Mande-St. Etienne, just north of the<br />
Marche highway, at the other. One can-<br />
not speak of battle lines in this sector:<br />
the two antagonists were mixed higgledy-<br />
piggledy and for much of the time<br />
with no certain knowledge of who w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
what village or at what crossroads. It<br />
is indicative of the confusion prevailing<br />
that the 501st tried to evacuate its regi-<br />
mental baggage train-which had suf-<br />
fered from enemy shelling-through Si-<br />
bret after Kampfgruppe Kunkel had cut<br />
the road north of the town by the d<strong>as</strong>h<br />
into Villeroux. (The 501st lost fifteen<br />
trucks and nearly all its bed rolls.)<br />
The arena in question earlier had<br />
been the 101st service area and con-<br />
tained in addition a good deal of the
466 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
VIII Corps’ artillery and trains. Much of<br />
the fighting on the 22d revolved around<br />
two battalions of armored field artillery:<br />
Colonel Paton’s 58th Armored Field<br />
Artillery Battalion, which had emplaced<br />
near Tillet–af ter the Longvilly battle–<br />
to support the 101st Airborne; and<br />
Browne’s 420th, now operating <strong>as</strong> a com-<br />
bined arms team on a 4,000-yard perim-<br />
eter in the neighborhood of Senon-<br />
champs. Tillet lay about six miles west<br />
of Senonchamps. Much of the interven-<br />
ing countryside w<strong>as</strong> in the hands of<br />
roving patrols from Panzer Lehr, one of<br />
which had erected a strong roadblock<br />
midway between the two villages.<br />
On the night of the 21st the Germans<br />
encircled Tillet, w<strong>here</strong> Paton, hard<br />
pressed, radioed the VIII Corps for help.<br />
Middleton relayed this SOS to B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
but Browne, himself under attack by<br />
Kunkel’s 26th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
reconnaissance battalion, w<strong>as</strong> forced to<br />
say that the 58th would have to get back<br />
to Senonchamps under its own power.<br />
Nevertheless, Team Yantis (one me-<br />
dium tank, two light tanks, and a couple<br />
of rifle squads) moved forward to the<br />
German roadblock, expecting to give<br />
the 58th a hand when day broke. 12<br />
Paton and his gunners never reached<br />
Team Browne, 13 which had had its<br />
hands full. Browne’s force not only had<br />
to defend a section of the B<strong>as</strong>togne per-<br />
imeter and bar the Senonchamps entry,<br />
but also had to serve the eighteen 105-<br />
12 Team Yantis (1st Lt. Ray J. Yantis) w<strong>as</strong> sent<br />
back on the night of 22 December to find a way<br />
through the enemy and bring back badly needed<br />
artillery ammunition from Neufchâteau. The team<br />
w<strong>as</strong> ambushed and shot up near Pinsamont and<br />
had to abandon its vehicles. Special AAR, Com.<br />
pany C, 55th Armored Engineer Battalion.<br />
13 See above, Chapter XIV, pages 328–29, for<br />
the rest of the story of the 58th Armored Field<br />
Artillery.<br />
mm. howitzers which, from battery posi-<br />
tions e<strong>as</strong>t and south of Senonchamps,<br />
provided round-the-clock fire support for<br />
friendly infantry five to eight miles dis-<br />
tant. Close-in defense w<strong>as</strong> provided by<br />
a platoon of thirty stragglers who had<br />
been rounded up by an airborne officer<br />
and deployed three hundred yards south<br />
of the gun positions. (This platoon held<br />
for two days until all were killed or<br />
captured.) Browne’s main weapon<br />
against the German tanks and self-pro-<br />
pelled guns w<strong>as</strong> not his howitzers but<br />
the seventeen Sherman tanks brought up<br />
by Team Pyle and Team Van Kleef the<br />
day before. These were disposed with<br />
nine tanks facing a series of wood lots<br />
west of the battery positions, four firing<br />
south, and the remaining four placed<br />
on the road to Villeroux.<br />
At daybreak the first t<strong>as</strong>k w<strong>as</strong> to clear<br />
the enemy from the woods which lay un-<br />
comfortably near the firing batteries.<br />
Pyle’s scratch force of riflemen entered<br />
the woods but found only a few Ger-<br />
mans. <strong>Of</strong>f to the northwest came the<br />
sound of firing from the area known to<br />
be occupied by a battalion of the 327th<br />
Glider Infantry; so Browne reported to<br />
Colonel Roberts that his team would join<br />
this fight <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> the woods were clear.<br />
Before the sortie could be organized, a<br />
detachment from Kampfgruppe Kunkel<br />
struck out from Villeroux against the<br />
American flank. Direct tank fire ch<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
the enemy away, but this w<strong>as</strong> only the<br />
opener. During the afternoon the enemy<br />
made three separate <strong>as</strong>saults from the<br />
woods that earlier had been reported<br />
cleared, and again the tanks made short<br />
work of the Germans (Van Kleef report-<br />
ed eighteen enemy tanks destroyed dur-<br />
ing the day).<br />
As the afternoon wore on fog and snow
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 467<br />
clouded the scene and the tank gunners<br />
began to lose their targets. The Ameri-<br />
can howitzer batteries, however, pro-<br />
vided a static and by this time a well-<br />
defined target for enemy counterbattery<br />
fire. At twilight Colonel Browne radioed<br />
CCB that his heterogeneous team w<strong>as</strong><br />
taking “terrible c<strong>as</strong>ualties.” Earlier he<br />
had <strong>as</strong>ked for more troops, and McAu-<br />
liffe had sent Company C of the 327th<br />
and Team Watts (about a hundred men,<br />
under Maj. Eugene A. Watts) from Team<br />
SNAFU. At dark the howitzer positions<br />
had a fairly substantial screen of infantry<br />
around them, although the enemy guns<br />
continued to pound away through the<br />
night.<br />
The airdrop laid on for the 22d never<br />
reached B<strong>as</strong>togne–bad flying weather<br />
continued <strong>as</strong> in the days p<strong>as</strong>t. All that<br />
the Third <strong>Army</strong> air liaison staff could do<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to send a message that “the 101st<br />
Airborne situation is known and appre-<br />
ciated.” Artillery ammunition w<strong>as</strong> run-<br />
ning very low. The large number of<br />
wounded congregated inside B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
presented a special problem: t<strong>here</strong> were<br />
too few medics, not enough surgical<br />
equipment, and blankets had to be gath-<br />
ered up from front-line troops to wrap<br />
the men suffering from wounds and<br />
shock. Nonetheless, morale w<strong>as</strong> high.<br />
Late in the afternoon word w<strong>as</strong> circu-<br />
lated to all the regiments that the 4th<br />
CASUALTIES IN AN IMPROVISED EMERGENCY WARD during the siege of B<strong>as</strong>togne.
468 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Armored and the 7th Armored (so vague<br />
w<strong>as</strong> information inside the perimeter)<br />
were on their way to B<strong>as</strong>togne; to the<br />
men in the line this w<strong>as</strong> heartening news.<br />
What may have been the biggest mo-<br />
rale booster came with a reverse twist–<br />
the enemy “ultimatum.” About noon<br />
four Germans under a white flag entered<br />
the lines of the 2d Battalion, 327th.<br />
The terms of the announcement they<br />
carried were simple: “the honorable sur-<br />
render of the encircled town,” this to be<br />
accomplished in two hours on threat of<br />
”annihilation” by the m<strong>as</strong>sed fires of<br />
the German artillery. The rest of the<br />
story h<strong>as</strong> become legend: how Gen-<br />
eral McAuliffe disdainfully answered<br />
“Nuts!”; and how Colonel Harper, com-<br />
mander of the 327th, hard pressed to<br />
translate the idiom, compromised on<br />
“Go to Hell!” The ultimatum had been<br />
signed rather ambiguously by “The Ger-<br />
man Commander,” and none of the Ger-<br />
man generals then in the B<strong>as</strong>togne sector<br />
seem to have been anxious to claim<br />
authorship. 14 Lt. Col. Paul A Danahy,<br />
G–2 of the 101st, saw to it that the story<br />
w<strong>as</strong> circulated–and appropriately em-<br />
bellished-in the daily periodic report:<br />
“The Commanding General’s answer<br />
w<strong>as</strong>, with a sarc<strong>as</strong>tic air of humorous<br />
tolerance, emphatically negative.” None-<br />
theless the 101st expected that the com-<br />
ing day—the 23d—would be rough.<br />
The morning of 23 December broke<br />
clear and cold. “Visibility unlimited,”<br />
the air-control posts happily reported all<br />
the way from the United Kingdom to<br />
the foxholes on the Ardennes front. <strong>To</strong><br />
most of the American soldiery this<br />
14 In a television interview early in 1960 General<br />
von Luettwitz admitted that he w<strong>as</strong> responsible<br />
for the ultimatum to the B<strong>as</strong>togne garrison. This<br />
confirms a like statement made to Colonel Marshall<br />
in 1945 but later denied by Luettwitz.<br />
would be a red-letter day–long remem-<br />
bered–because of the bombers and<br />
fighter-bombers once more streaming<br />
overhead like shoals of silver minnows<br />
in the bright winter sun, their sharply<br />
etched contrails making a wake behind<br />
them in the cold air.<br />
In B<strong>as</strong>togne, however, all eyes looked<br />
for the squat planes of the Troop Carrier<br />
Command. About 0900 a Pathfinder<br />
team dropped inside the perimeter and<br />
set up the apparatus to guide the C–47’s<br />
over a drop zone between Senon-<br />
champs and B<strong>as</strong>togne. The first of the<br />
carriers dropped its six parapacks at<br />
1150, and in little more than four hours<br />
241 planes had been vectored to B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne. Each plane carried some twelve<br />
hundred pounds, but not all reached the<br />
drop zone nor did all the parapacks fall<br />
w<strong>here</strong> the Americans could recover<br />
them. Nevertheless this day’s drop les-<br />
sened the pinch–<strong>as</strong> the records of the<br />
101st gratefully acknowledge. On 24 De-<br />
cember a total of 160 planes would take<br />
part in the drop; poor flying weather on<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Day virtually scrubbed all<br />
cargo missions-although eleven gliders<br />
did bring in a team of four surgeons<br />
and some POL badly needed by Roberts’<br />
tanks. The biggest airlift day of the siege<br />
would come on the 26th with 289 planes<br />
flying the B<strong>as</strong>togne run. 15<br />
The bulk of the air cargo brought to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne during the siege w<strong>as</strong> artillery<br />
ammunition. By the 24th the airborne<br />
batteries were down to ten rounds per<br />
tube and the work horse 420th Armored<br />
Field Artillery w<strong>as</strong> expending no more<br />
than five rounds per mission, even on<br />
15 A complete listing of the B<strong>as</strong>togne airdrop<br />
missions, carrier losses, weather conditions, and<br />
similar information can be found in Thompson’s<br />
MS, Air Supply to Isolated Units, pp. 64–135.
SUPPLY BY AIR. Pathfinder unit (above) sets up radar equipment. Medical supplies (be-<br />
low) are dragged by hand from drop Zone.
470 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
very lucrative targets. This battalion,<br />
covering a 360-degree front, would in<br />
fact be forced to make its original 1,400<br />
rounds l<strong>as</strong>t for five days. The two 155-<br />
mm. howitzer battalions were really<br />
pawing at the bottom of the barrel. The<br />
969th fired thirty-nine rounds on 24 De-<br />
cember and two days later could allow<br />
its gunners only twenty-seven rounds,<br />
one-sixth the number of rounds ex-<br />
pended per day when the battle began.<br />
The airdrop on the 23d brought a div-<br />
idend for the troops defending B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The cargo planes were all overwatched<br />
by fighters who, their protective mission<br />
accomplished, turned to hammer the<br />
Germans in the B<strong>as</strong>togne ring. During<br />
the day eighty-two P–47’s l<strong>as</strong>hed out at<br />
this enemy with general-purpose and<br />
fragmentation bombs, napalm, and<br />
machine gun fire. The 101st reported<br />
to Middleton, whose staff w<strong>as</strong> han-<br />
dling these air strikes for the division,<br />
that “air and artillery is having a field<br />
day around B<strong>as</strong>togne.”<br />
The German attack on the 23d w<strong>as</strong><br />
mounted by the 26th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division and the attached regiment left<br />
behind by Panzer Lehr. Lacking the<br />
men and tanks for an <strong>as</strong>sault around<br />
the entire perimeter, General Kokott<br />
elected to continue the fight at Senon-<br />
champs while attacking in two sectors<br />
diametrically opposite each other, the<br />
Marvie area in the southe<strong>as</strong>t and the<br />
Flamierge area in the northwest. By the<br />
happenstance of its late and piecemeal<br />
deployment the 327th Glider Infantry<br />
stood in front of the enemy at both these<br />
critical points.<br />
The 5th Parachute Division, now bad-<br />
ly fought out and with gaping ranks,<br />
could be of little help at B<strong>as</strong>togne. Ac-<br />
tually this division w<strong>as</strong> scattered on a<br />
front of eighteen miles, reaching from<br />
Neufchâteau clear back to the Sauer<br />
crossings. Indeed, during the day the<br />
26th Yolks Grenadier Division had to<br />
take over the portion of the 5th Para-<br />
chute line between Clochimont and<br />
Hompré because the American forces<br />
from the south threatened to pierce this<br />
very thinly occupied segment of the<br />
blocking line. Kokott, then, could em-<br />
ploy only two regiments and his recon-<br />
naissance battalion in the <strong>as</strong>sault, while<br />
maintaining what pressure the remain-<br />
ing two regiments might have along the<br />
balance of the American perimeter.<br />
The enemy tactics on this and the fol-<br />
lowing days reflect the manner in<br />
which Kokott had to husband his re-<br />
sources. Extensive preparatory fires by<br />
artillery and Werfers opened the show<br />
while the infantry wormed in <strong>as</strong> close to<br />
the American foxhole line <strong>as</strong> possible.<br />
By this time the new-fallen snow had<br />
put every dark object in full relief; the<br />
grenadiers now donned white snow<br />
capes and the panzers were painted<br />
white. (The Americans replied in kind<br />
with wholesale raids on Belgian bed<br />
linen and with whitew<strong>as</strong>h for their ar-<br />
mored vehicles.) The <strong>as</strong>sault would be<br />
led by a tank platoon–normally four or<br />
five panzers–followed by fifty to a hun-<br />
dred infantry. If this first wave failed,<br />
a second or third–seldom larger than<br />
the initial wave–would be thrown in.<br />
It is clear, however, that the German<br />
commander and his troops were chary<br />
of m<strong>as</strong>sed tactics at this stage of the<br />
game.<br />
The 39th Volks Grenadier Regiment,<br />
freshest in Kokott’s division, w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sem-<br />
bled to the west and northwest opposite<br />
Team Browne and the 3d Battalion of<br />
the 327th. The latter had maintained
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 471<br />
an observation post at Flamierge and<br />
a string of roadblocks along the Flam-<br />
ierge road well in front of the battalion<br />
position. Here the enemy dealt the first<br />
blow of the day and got into Flamierge,<br />
only to be ch<strong>as</strong>ed out by a counterat-<br />
tack. Next, the enemy gat<strong>here</strong>d south of<br />
Company C—positioned <strong>as</strong>tride the<br />
Marche highway–and tried to shoot the<br />
Americans out with tank fire. In early<br />
evening the Germans moved in for the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault and at one point it w<strong>as</strong> reported<br />
that Company C had been lost. This w<strong>as</strong><br />
far from fact for the American artillery<br />
beat off the attackers; the 3d Battalion,<br />
however, pulled back closer to B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
This enemy effort also extended to em-<br />
brace Team Browne. More infantry<br />
were hurried to Senonchamps on light<br />
tanks, and at 1830 McAuliffe sent one<br />
half of his mobile reserve (Team<br />
Cherry) to give a hand against the Ger-<br />
man tanks. But the American tanks,<br />
tank destroyers, and artillery already on<br />
the scene were able to handle the pan-<br />
zers without additional help–and even<br />
while this fight w<strong>as</strong> on the cannoneers<br />
around Senonchamps turned their<br />
pieces to lob shells across the perimeter<br />
in support of the hard-driven paratroop-<br />
ers and tankers at Marvie.<br />
During the hours of light the 901st<br />
made no move to carry out its scheduled<br />
attack between Marvie and the Arlon<br />
road. Quite possibly the activity of the<br />
American fighter-bombers, once more in<br />
the skies, made it necessary to wait for<br />
nightfall. Through the afternoon the en-<br />
emy shelled the 2d Battalion, 327th, and<br />
its command post in Marvie. As night<br />
came on the barrage incre<strong>as</strong>ed in inten-<br />
sity, sweeping along the battalion front<br />
and onto its northern flank–beyond<br />
Marvie—w<strong>here</strong> Team O’Hara stood<br />
with its tanks.<br />
At 1845 the 901st (with at le<strong>as</strong>t two<br />
tank companies in support) commenced<br />
a co-ordinated attack delivered by pla-<br />
toons and companies against the front<br />
manned by the 2d Battalion and Team<br />
O’Hara. 16 One quick rush put an enemy<br />
detachment on a hill south of Marvie<br />
which overlooked this village. The pla-<br />
toon of paratroopers on the hill w<strong>as</strong><br />
surrounded and destroyed, but when a<br />
half-track and a brace of tanks tried to<br />
move down the hill into Marvie a lucky<br />
shot or a mine disabled the half-track,<br />
leaving no way p<strong>as</strong>t for the tanks. On<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne-Arlon road a group of tanks<br />
(twelve were counted) started north to-<br />
ward the right flank of the 2d Battalion.<br />
Here Company F later reported that the<br />
tanks “made repeated attempts to over-<br />
run our positions but were halted.” It is<br />
probable that the three medium tanks<br />
from Team O’Hara and the three tank<br />
destroyers from the 609th Tank De-<br />
stroyer Battalion which stood <strong>as</strong>tride the<br />
road (not to mention the darkness and<br />
artillery fire) had a more ch<strong>as</strong>tening<br />
effect on the panzers than the small arms<br />
fire of the paratroopers.<br />
The Germans seem to have had the<br />
village of Marvie <strong>as</strong> their main objective<br />
for by midnight the fight had died down<br />
all along the line except at Marvie,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> it burst out with fresh virulence.<br />
It is estimated that at le<strong>as</strong>t one rifle<br />
battalion and some fifteen tanks were<br />
thrown against Company E (now rein-<br />
forced by an understrength company of<br />
airborne engineers) and Team O’Hara.<br />
16 The official records credit Pfc. N. A. Osterberg,<br />
a bazooka man of headquarters company, with<br />
driving back the German tanks that <strong>as</strong>saulted the<br />
2d Battalion positions. Private Osterberg w<strong>as</strong><br />
wounded during the three-hour fight. He w<strong>as</strong><br />
awarded the DSC.
472 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Using the hill which earlier had been<br />
wrested from Company G <strong>as</strong> a mounting<br />
block, three German tanks made their<br />
way into the south edge of Marvie, but<br />
O’Hara’s tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns stopped<br />
a major penetration from the e<strong>as</strong>t by<br />
gunning down the panzers silhouetted<br />
in the glare of burning buildings, thus<br />
enabling the Americans to hold on in<br />
the north half of the village. The threat<br />
of a breach <strong>here</strong> impelled McAuliffe to<br />
send the remaining half of Team Cherry<br />
to Marvie. Because this switch stripped<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne of its l<strong>as</strong>t counterattack force,<br />
Cherry’s detachment, which had gone<br />
west to <strong>as</strong>sist Team Browne, w<strong>as</strong> recalled<br />
to B<strong>as</strong>togne. An hour before dawn on<br />
the 24th the battle ended and quiet came<br />
to Marvie. O’Hara’s troops had ac-<br />
counted for eight panzers in this fight,<br />
but the village w<strong>as</strong> still clutched by both<br />
antagonists.<br />
The battle on the 23d had been<br />
viewed in a somewhat somber light in-<br />
side B<strong>as</strong>togne. That evening, only a few<br />
minutes after the German attack began<br />
in the Marvie sector, Lt. Col. Harry W.<br />
O. Kinnard (the 101st Airborne Divi-<br />
sion G–3) telephoned his opposite num-<br />
ber at the VIII Corps command post.<br />
The gist of his report, <strong>as</strong> recorded in the<br />
corps G–3 journal, w<strong>as</strong> this: “In regard<br />
to our situation it is getting pretty<br />
sticky around <strong>here</strong>. They [the 4th Ar-<br />
mored Division] must keep coming.<br />
The enemy h<strong>as</strong> attacked all along the<br />
south and some tanks are through and<br />
running around in our area. Request<br />
you inform 4th Armored Division of our<br />
situation and <strong>as</strong>k them to put on all<br />
possible pressure.”<br />
The events of the p<strong>as</strong>t hours had<br />
shown that the force under McAuliffe’s<br />
command w<strong>as</strong> overextended at a num-<br />
ber of points. The artillery groupment<br />
west of B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>as</strong> particularly ex-<br />
posed, and the 327th Glider Infantry<br />
had already been forced to shorten its<br />
lines. Then too the segments of the pe-<br />
rimeter defense were not <strong>as</strong> well co-<br />
ordinated <strong>as</strong> they might be. The tankers<br />
of CCB complained that they had no<br />
idea of the airborne positions, and quite<br />
probably the regiments of the 101st<br />
were hazy <strong>as</strong> to the location of the small<br />
tank and tank destroyer detachments on<br />
their flanks.<br />
Colonel Kinnard, whose sharp tactical<br />
sense w<strong>as</strong> rated highly by all the com-<br />
manders who worked with him during<br />
the siege, drew up on 24 December a<br />
plan to regroup the B<strong>as</strong>togne forces. The<br />
plan w<strong>as</strong> put into operation that same<br />
evening. Kinnard’s scheme placed all<br />
four regiments of the 101st Airborne on<br />
the line <strong>as</strong> combined arms teams. Team<br />
O’Hara and a platoon of the 705th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion were attached to the<br />
501st. The 506th, whose sector had been<br />
quiet, got two platoons of the 705th but<br />
no tanks. The 502d w<strong>as</strong> given two pla-<br />
toons from the 705th and Team Ander-<br />
son (it is symptomatic of the shoestring<br />
defense which perforce had evolved at<br />
the perimeter that Captain Anderson’s<br />
“team” consisted of two cavalry <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault guns, one tank destroyer, and<br />
two jeeps). The 327th took over the<br />
326th Airborne Engineer Battalion, two<br />
platoons of the 9th Armored Engineer<br />
Battalion (which had won distinction in<br />
the Noville fight), and four platoons of<br />
the 705th. Also attached to the 327th<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the amalgam of infantry, tank de-<br />
stroyers, and tanks which had grown up<br />
around Browne’s 420th Armored Field<br />
Artillery Battalion and which, on the<br />
23d, had been reorganized <strong>as</strong> Team
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 473<br />
Roberts. (Colonel Browne w<strong>as</strong> wounded<br />
by a shell fragment on the 24th and died<br />
the next day.) 17<br />
This readjustment of the 101st posi-<br />
tions resulted in a taut and tenuous line<br />
of approximately sixteen miles. (Map 4)<br />
That it could not be defended in equal<br />
strength at all points w<strong>as</strong> not only a mili-<br />
tary aphorism but a simple fact dictated<br />
by the troops available and the accidents<br />
17 He received a posthumous award of the DSC.<br />
MAP 4<br />
of the ground. Creation of a tactical reserve<br />
w<strong>as</strong> t<strong>here</strong>fore mandatory, albeit<br />
difficult of accomplishment with the<br />
limited mechanized force at McAuliffe’s<br />
disposal. The 101st reserve, <strong>as</strong> now organized,<br />
consisted of Roberts’ CCB; that is,<br />
Teams Cherry and Arnsdorf (with perhaps<br />
nine medium and five light tanks<br />
operational at any given time) plus a<br />
part of the original Team SNAFU, put<br />
together by Colonel Roberts from the<br />
remnants of CCR, 9th Armored, and various<br />
waifs and strays. (Colonel Gilbreth,
474 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the commander of SNAFU, w<strong>as</strong> wounded<br />
on the 22d and then hospitalized.)<br />
This reshuffle stripped CCB of its own<br />
reserve; so Roberts organized a new<br />
formation (Team Palmaccio, com-<br />
manded by 1st Lt. Charles P. Palmaccio)<br />
equipped with four antiaircraft half-<br />
tracks, one tank destroyer, and two light<br />
tanks. Roadblocks at the entrances to B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne were established, each manned by<br />
two guns from Company C, 609th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion. Inside B<strong>as</strong>togne it-<br />
self, McAuliffe had a part of Team SNA-<br />
FU <strong>as</strong> a kind of “interior guard,” backed<br />
up by four self-propelled tank destroyers<br />
and forty men from the 705th. All this<br />
regrouping tightened and strengthened<br />
the rifle line surrounding B<strong>as</strong>togne, but<br />
the resources at hand for fire fighting<br />
enemy armored incursions or for quick,<br />
local counterattacks were woefully lim-<br />
ited-<strong>as</strong> shown by the commitment of<br />
Team Cherry on opposite sides of the<br />
perimeter during 23–24 December.<br />
General Luettwitz, with only a rein-<br />
forced division to use against B<strong>as</strong>togne,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> worse off than McAuliffe. He had<br />
been given rather vague promises of re-<br />
inforcement, but no decision w<strong>as</strong> ren-<br />
dered by the High Command until the<br />
23d when Hitler agreed to rele<strong>as</strong>e two<br />
fresh divisions (the 9th Panzer and 15th<br />
Panzer Grenadier) from the OKW re-<br />
serve. Once these troops were handed<br />
over to <strong>Army</strong> Group B, Field Marshal<br />
Model decided that they were more<br />
sorely needed to shore up the left flank<br />
of the Fifth Panzer and Seventh Armies<br />
than at B<strong>as</strong>togne. One regimental com-<br />
bat team from the 15th Panzer Grena-<br />
dier Division w<strong>as</strong> all he would give<br />
Luettwitz for the B<strong>as</strong>togne operation.<br />
On both sides of the line, then, the<br />
daylight hours of the 24th were spent in<br />
regrouping, this punctuated with heavy<br />
gusts of artillery and mortar fire when-<br />
ever the opponent showed signs of move-<br />
ment. Once again, however, a beautiful<br />
flying day gave the Americans an edge.<br />
P–47’s belonging to the 512th, 513th,<br />
and 514th Squadrons of the XIX Tac-<br />
tical Air Command worked around the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter, at one point, in the<br />
Noville sector, bombing so close to the<br />
airborne lines that the 101st sent frantic<br />
word to the VIII Corps <strong>as</strong>king that the<br />
flight leader be told to call off the mis-<br />
sion. The 115th Kampfgruppe from the<br />
15th Panzer Grenadier Division duly<br />
arrived for attachment to Kokott’s divi-<br />
sion and took over a sector in the north-<br />
west between Flamierge and Givry. The<br />
420th Armored Field Artillery Battalion<br />
and the medium howitzer battalions dis-<br />
placed to new firing positions just north<br />
of the Marche road and not more than a<br />
mile and a half from B<strong>as</strong>togne. The<br />
Americans abandoned their l<strong>as</strong>t road-<br />
block at Mande-St. Etienne—now it w<strong>as</strong><br />
too far out-and drew in the western line<br />
held by Team Roberts and the 3d Bat-<br />
talion of the 327th. Germans and Amer-<br />
icans both claimed Marvie, a circum-<br />
stance which may have accounted for an<br />
American air strike on Marvie by P–47’s<br />
during the afternoon.<br />
In the headquarters at B<strong>as</strong>togne Mc-<br />
Auliffe’s staff had been kept pretty well<br />
abre<strong>as</strong>t of the enemy movements indica-<br />
tive of incoming reinforcement. Team<br />
Anderson, scouting around Champs, re-<br />
ported armor and tracked vehicles mov-<br />
ing into Givry (this w<strong>as</strong> the new 115th<br />
Kampfgruppe) ; other reports noted the<br />
movement of German traffic coming<br />
from the northe<strong>as</strong>t and moving south-<br />
ward across the American front. All this<br />
must have been a headache for the 101st
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 475<br />
G–2, but <strong>as</strong>ide from shortening the lines<br />
and tightening up tactical control t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> little the Americans could do but<br />
wait for the blow to fall.<br />
Early in the afternoon the VIII Corps<br />
relayed a message from General Patton<br />
and the Third <strong>Army</strong>: “Xm<strong>as</strong> Eve pres-<br />
ent coming up. Hold on.” But t<strong>here</strong><br />
were more tangible items to lessen the<br />
nostalgia and depression of the sur-<br />
rounded garrison on Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve. The<br />
second day of air resupply had been<br />
“a tremendous morale booster”–so re-<br />
ported CCB and most of the regiments.<br />
Allied air activity on the 24th had heart-<br />
ened the men on the ground. When<br />
night fell they could see the fires left <strong>as</strong><br />
aftermath of the fighter-bomber strikes<br />
blazing all the way round the perimeter.<br />
(Twice during the night of 24 Decem-<br />
ber, however, the Luftwaffe retaliated<br />
with very damaging and lethal bombing<br />
sorties on B<strong>as</strong>togne and the surrounding<br />
area.) Less obtrusive but of considerable<br />
impact w<strong>as</strong> the confidence that the com-<br />
manders and the troops had in each<br />
other; a lesson for future commanders<br />
may be read in the considerable effort<br />
put forth by McAuliffe, Roberts, and the<br />
regimental commanders to apprise all<br />
the troops of the “situation.”<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve in the German head-<br />
quarters brought forth some cognac and<br />
a few “Prosits” but in the main w<strong>as</strong> de-<br />
voted to preparations for a major attack<br />
on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day. As late <strong>as</strong> the evening<br />
of the 24th Luettwitz hoped to obtain<br />
more troops from the 15th Panzer Gren-<br />
adier Division, but the Fuehrer had<br />
other ide<strong>as</strong>. Earlier in the day the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> commander posed a ques-<br />
tion which finally reached Jodl and Hit-<br />
ler: should he turn to finish off B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
or continue, with the bulk of his divi-<br />
sions, toward the Meuse and seize the<br />
Marche plateau in an attempt to widen<br />
the German thrust? Hitler’s answer,<br />
finally relayed by Model, w<strong>as</strong> that the<br />
attack to seize the Marche plateau should<br />
be continued with all available forces.<br />
This answer did nothing to relieve Man-<br />
teuffel’s worries about his thin and en-<br />
dangered southern flank. 18 <strong>To</strong> leave<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne <strong>as</strong> a sally port onto his left<br />
rear made no military sense to this ex-<br />
perienced soldier-so Manteuffel ordered<br />
that B<strong>as</strong>togne be taken on 25 December.<br />
(The attack order read: “Displacement<br />
[in this context a kind of euphemism<br />
for “destruction”] of the enemy at B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne.”)<br />
The German order of battle on Christ-<br />
m<strong>as</strong> Eve w<strong>as</strong> this (read from the north<br />
clockwise). The 26th Volks Grenadier<br />
engineer battalion and a few antitank<br />
guns maintained a security screen in the<br />
Foy-Recogne sector. The 78th Fuesiliers,<br />
brought back to strength by a large draft<br />
of replacements, held on a front extend-<br />
ing from Foy to Neffe. The 901st, its<br />
ranks much depleted by the fighting just<br />
ended, continued the circle p<strong>as</strong>t Marvie<br />
and to a point west of the Arlon road.<br />
The 39th w<strong>as</strong> deployed on both sides of<br />
the Neufchâteau road. What earlier had<br />
been the “western front”–that is, from<br />
Senonchamps north to the Marche road<br />
18 All of the higher German field commanders<br />
appear to have been in a quandary at this stage<br />
<strong>as</strong> to Hitler’s intention toward B<strong>as</strong>togne. See<br />
Manteuffel’s queries to his superiors <strong>as</strong> described<br />
in MS #B–151a, and ETHINT–46, Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, Mission of November 1944–January 1945.<br />
In a conference which the author held with<br />
Manteuffel and his chief of staff, Generalmajor<br />
Carl Gustav Wagener, in Karlsruhe on io June<br />
1960, Wagener said that Hitler expressed no<br />
particular interest in B<strong>as</strong>togne during the offensive<br />
ph<strong>as</strong>e, nor did he insist that his original orders<br />
to capture B<strong>as</strong>togne be followed.
476 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
–w<strong>as</strong> occupied by the reconnaissance<br />
battalion of the 26th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division, which had moved onto the<br />
ground left free by the American with-<br />
drawal on the 24th. The regiment from<br />
the incoming 15th Panzer Grenadier<br />
Division (Colonel Deckert) w<strong>as</strong> bivou-<br />
acked west of Flamizoulle. The 77th<br />
Fuesilier Regiment completed the circle,<br />
the bulk of its troops concentrated west<br />
of Champs. Une<strong>as</strong>y about the ability of<br />
the 5th Parachute Division to cover his<br />
back, Kokott w<strong>as</strong> forced to strip a few<br />
companies from his own division and the<br />
901st to form a subsidiary front facing<br />
south.<br />
The attack plan for the 25th turned<br />
on the fresh strength provided by the<br />
15th Panzer Grenadier (–). The main<br />
effort would be made in the northwest<br />
between the Marche road and Champs,<br />
the latter point included <strong>as</strong> an initial<br />
objective. It w<strong>as</strong> known that the Amer-<br />
ican hold in this sector w<strong>as</strong> weak, the<br />
frozen ground gave good tank going and<br />
observation for the artillery, and t<strong>here</strong><br />
were no large villages or woods to hold<br />
up the <strong>as</strong>sault. <strong>To</strong> open a way for the<br />
main effort Kokott quietly <strong>as</strong>sembled the<br />
major part of his division artillery<br />
around Flamierge and Givry. The plan<br />
included a heavy blow by the Luftwaffe<br />
against B<strong>as</strong>togne itself (this eventuated<br />
in the two bombing attacks during the<br />
A BASTOGNE STREET AFTER LUFTWAFFE BOMBARDMENT
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 477<br />
night of 24 December which killed a<br />
Belgian nurse and a score of wounded<br />
paratroopers) .<br />
The original time schedule w<strong>as</strong> ex-<br />
ceedingly optimistic: to put in the in-<br />
fantry <strong>as</strong>sault at 0400; to break through<br />
the American rifle line by 0600, at which<br />
time the artillery could see to fire on<br />
targets of opportunity and the tanks<br />
would be able to move with speed; and<br />
to rush an armored group from the 15th<br />
Panzer Grenadier into B<strong>as</strong>togne be-<br />
tween 0800 and 0900 hours before the<br />
American fighter-bombers took to the<br />
air.<br />
The optimism breathed by this sched-<br />
ule must have expired shortly after it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> put on paper although the plan re-<br />
mained. Kokott h<strong>as</strong> recorded his shock<br />
and surprise at the weak state of the<br />
reinforcements brought in by Deckert:<br />
the 115th Regiment (three battalions of<br />
fusiliers) , the reconnaissance battalion<br />
and two armored field artillery battal-<br />
ions of the 15th Panzer Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion, a company of tank destroyers, and<br />
seventeen tanks belonging to the 115th<br />
Panzer Battalion. Hitler’s failure to<br />
name B<strong>as</strong>togne <strong>as</strong> the primary objective<br />
had been reflected in the dilatory and<br />
contradictory orders issued by the higher<br />
commanders for the employment of<br />
Deckert’s division. True, the second of<br />
Deckert’s regiments (the 104th) finally<br />
had been given to the XLVII Panzer<br />
Corps, but on Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve it w<strong>as</strong> toil-<br />
ing slowly toward the e<strong>as</strong>t side of B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne and would not arrive in time to<br />
join the battle. Col. Wolfgang Maucke,<br />
commander of the 115th, objected–<strong>as</strong><br />
strongly <strong>as</strong> a colonel would dare—when<br />
he received his orders toward dusk on<br />
the 24th. He had been given no time for<br />
reconnaissance; no co-ordination had<br />
been arranged with the tanks supposed<br />
to support the 115th. Maucke’s supe-<br />
riors simply pointed out the tremendous<br />
advantage that would accrue to a sur-<br />
prise attack on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day—he had<br />
his orders. 19<br />
The main <strong>as</strong>sault, handed the ele-<br />
ments of the 15th Panzer Grenadier, w<strong>as</strong><br />
to be a straight thrust over Flamizoulle<br />
into B<strong>as</strong>togne with the right wing guid-<br />
ing on the Marche highway, a distance of<br />
about four miles. For this Maucke put<br />
two battalions in line and one in reserve.<br />
The 1st Battalion, with tanks carrying<br />
some of the infantry, w<strong>as</strong> to p<strong>as</strong>s through<br />
Flamizoulle; the 2d Battalion, supported<br />
by the tank destroyer company, would<br />
circle Flamizoulle to the north and strike<br />
for the northern edge of B<strong>as</strong>togne. <strong>To</strong><br />
the left of Maucke’s kampfgruppe the<br />
77th Grenadier Regiment w<strong>as</strong> ordered<br />
to attack along the secondary road run-<br />
ning through Champs and Hemroulle<br />
into B<strong>as</strong>togne. Here the 1st Battalion<br />
had the job of seizing Champs and open-<br />
ing the way while the 2d Battalion,<br />
following to the left and rear, would be<br />
prepared to leapfrog forward <strong>as</strong> Champs<br />
fell, the two making the final push into<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne abre<strong>as</strong>t. The reconnaissance<br />
battalion of the 26th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division, south of Maucke’s force, had a<br />
special mission: to attack from Senon-<br />
champs and pierce the new American<br />
position by seizing Isle-la-Hesse, a ham-<br />
let standing w<strong>here</strong> the Senonchamps<br />
road fed into the Marche highway. Al-<br />
though nearly all the German units sur-<br />
19<br />
The history of the 15th Panzer Grenadier<br />
Division is related by the commander of the<br />
detachments at B<strong>as</strong>togne in MS # P–032c,<br />
Ardennes Project: Report on the 15th Panzer<br />
Grenadier Division, 16 December 1944–2 February<br />
1945 (Maucke) .
478 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
rounding B<strong>as</strong>togne had some diversion-<br />
ary mission during the Christm<strong>as</strong> Day<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault, only the 39th Grenadier Regi-<br />
ment had a major attack <strong>as</strong>signed in<br />
support of the effort in the northwest,<br />
this to be an advance <strong>as</strong>tride the Neuf-<br />
château-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway (which w<strong>as</strong><br />
never carried out).<br />
The Battle on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day<br />
About 0300 a few German planes<br />
droned over the 502d lines and dropped<br />
bombs indiscriminately around Rolle,<br />
the regimental command post. This<br />
seems to have been the Luftwaffe sup-<br />
port promised Kokott. A few minutes<br />
later the German gunners and mortar<br />
crews started to work, their target the<br />
American positions at Champs. Here<br />
Company A of the 502d w<strong>as</strong> deployed<br />
on the northwest edge of the village, its<br />
right flank joining the 2d Battalion in a<br />
large wood lot midway between Champs<br />
and Longchamps. Clad in white snow<br />
suits the first German <strong>as</strong>sault party, some<br />
fifty grenadiers from the 77th, crept for-<br />
ward under the waning moon toward<br />
Champs. At 0400 this group d<strong>as</strong>hed into<br />
the village and the German attack be-<br />
gan. More of the enemy moved through<br />
the woods against the left flank of the<br />
2d Battalion, and within the hour a full<br />
German battalion had joined the fight.<br />
Company B moved up <strong>as</strong> a backstop if<br />
its sister company should be engulfed or<br />
pushed <strong>as</strong>ide, but the confused melee<br />
around Champs in the predawn darkness<br />
pinned the Germans down.<br />
Meanwhile the two <strong>as</strong>sault battalions<br />
of the 15th Panzer Grenadier Division<br />
were moving against the 3d Battalion of<br />
the 327th. The tank group on the right<br />
of the German line drew ahead of its<br />
marching partner and an hour and a<br />
quarter after the advance began reported<br />
to Kokott that the only evidence of<br />
American reaction w<strong>as</strong> some tank or<br />
tank destroyer fire coming in from the<br />
south. Thirty minutes later a brief and<br />
optimistic radio message fl<strong>as</strong>hed to the<br />
rear: the tanks and the infantry battal-<br />
ion festooned t<strong>here</strong>on had reached the<br />
western edge of B<strong>as</strong>togne. But elation at<br />
the German command post w<strong>as</strong> short<br />
lived: word that the German tanks were<br />
in the streets of B<strong>as</strong>togne never came.<br />
The commander of the 115th sent a<br />
liaison officer forward to find the battal-<br />
ion or its tanks, but without success.<br />
German forward observers were alerted<br />
to listen for the sound of German tank<br />
fire-but all they could hear w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
cr<strong>as</strong>h of artillery fire and the crump of<br />
exploding mortar shells.<br />
The story of the lost tank group is<br />
soon told. The eighteen Mark IV’s and<br />
the riding grenadiers had broken<br />
through the positions held by Compan-<br />
ies A and B of the 327th Glider Infantry<br />
before dawn and got <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the battal-<br />
ion command post. Several of the enemy<br />
tanks p<strong>as</strong>sed straight through battery<br />
positions of the 755th Field Artillery<br />
Battalion, whose gunners opened up<br />
with machine guns <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> they dis-<br />
cerned the distinctive German muzzle-<br />
brakes. But the 155-mm. howitzers could<br />
not be brought to bear at such close<br />
range and the Germans rolled on un-<br />
scathed. Just west of Hemroulle about<br />
half the German tanks wheeled left, de-<br />
filing along a cart path which led to the<br />
road between Champs and B<strong>as</strong>togne. As<br />
they approached the road the panzers<br />
formed in line abre<strong>as</strong>t, now bearing<br />
straight toward Companies B and C of<br />
the 502d, which were on the march to
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 479<br />
help the paratroopers in Champs.<br />
Colonel Chappuis had a few minutes<br />
to face his companies toward the on-<br />
coming tanks, but the initial shock w<strong>as</strong><br />
absorbed by two tank destroyers from<br />
Company B of the 705th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion which were knocked out <strong>as</strong><br />
they fell back toward the Champs road. 20<br />
As the panzers rolled forward, Company<br />
C made an orderly withdrawal to the<br />
edge of a large wood lot midway be-<br />
tween Champs and Hemroulle. Now it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the paratroopers’ turn. They<br />
showered the tanks with lead, and the<br />
German infantry clinging to the decks<br />
and sides fell to the snow. The tank<br />
detachment again wheeled into column,<br />
this time turning toward Champs. Two<br />
of the 705th tank destroyers, which were<br />
backing up Company C, caught the col-<br />
umn in process of turning and put away<br />
three of the panzers; the paratroopers’<br />
bazook<strong>as</strong> accounted for two more.<br />
The half of the enemy tank-infantry<br />
formation which had kept on toward<br />
Hemroulle after knifing through the<br />
327th foxhole line received its coup de<br />
grâce in a fury of cross fire laid down by<br />
four of the 705th tank destroyers, tanks<br />
from Team Roberts, the 463d Parachute<br />
Field Artillery Battalion, and bazook<strong>as</strong><br />
handled by the glider infantry. As re-<br />
counted by Col. s. L. A. Marshall after<br />
the battle: “The German tanks were<br />
fired at from so many directions and with<br />
such a mixture of fire that it w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
possible to see or say how each tank met<br />
its doom.” The survivors of those pan-<br />
zer grenadiers of the 1st Battalion who<br />
had ridden into battle on the tanks<br />
found themselves surrounded and alone,<br />
for the American rifle line had sealed<br />
20 Colonel Chappuis later w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.<br />
itself after the initial armored punctures.<br />
About fifty German riflemen who had<br />
hidden in a stream bed were captured by<br />
cannoneers from the 755th. At noon<br />
General Kokott wrote the tanks and the<br />
accompanying infantry from the 1st<br />
Battalion of the 115th off <strong>as</strong> lost—why<br />
and w<strong>here</strong> remained a mystery to the<br />
German headquarters.<br />
The 2d Battalion of the 115th seems to<br />
have made good use of the rupture<br />
created in the 327th positions west of<br />
Hemroulle, advancing almost unper-<br />
ceived and unopposed until daybreak<br />
when it w<strong>as</strong> brought under fire by Com-<br />
pany C, the 3d Battalion reserve. At first<br />
light the American artillery and mor-<br />
tars took on the German infantry starkly<br />
outlined against the snow-covered slopes<br />
west of Hemroulle. The panzer grena-<br />
diers tried digging in but the ground<br />
w<strong>as</strong> too hard frozen; so they lay in the<br />
snow and took their losses. The regimen-<br />
tal commander, Colonel Maucke, began<br />
in midmorning to re-form his remaining<br />
troops, pulling what w<strong>as</strong> left of the 1st<br />
Battalion back to a hill southe<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Flamizoulle (w<strong>here</strong> it took a merciless<br />
pounding from Allied fighter-bombers)<br />
and sending his reserve battalion into<br />
the woods north of the 1st to cover its<br />
flank. When night fell Maucke ordered<br />
the remnants of the 1st Battalion to<br />
sideslip south across the gap left by the<br />
disappearance of the tank group. <strong>Of</strong> the<br />
battalion staff all were dead or wounded<br />
and the battalion commander w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
young lieutenant from one of the rifle<br />
companies. Maucke himself went for-<br />
ward to find his lost tanks but w<strong>as</strong><br />
stopped by machine gun fire.<br />
At Champs, w<strong>here</strong> the battle had be-<br />
gun, most of the Germans left the village<br />
in the middle of the morning to let their
480 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
gunners bl<strong>as</strong>t the paratroopers out of the<br />
houses and surrounding woods. The<br />
commander of the 77th, apprehensive of<br />
a continued house-to-house battle, <strong>as</strong>ked<br />
for and received permission to circle<br />
around the village, but the new attack<br />
up the slopes toward Hemroulle w<strong>as</strong><br />
shot to pieces. In the early afternoon<br />
General Kokott called the German attack<br />
to a halt, planning to resume the battle<br />
under cover of the night.<br />
This l<strong>as</strong>t “desperate effort,” <strong>as</strong> Kokott<br />
himself termed it, took long to organize<br />
and did not get under way until the<br />
morning hours of the 26th. Using the<br />
German salient at the Isle-la-Hesse road<br />
fork <strong>as</strong> his b<strong>as</strong>e, Kokott sent a small <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault group from his own division and<br />
ten mobile tank destroyers northe<strong>as</strong>t in<br />
the direction of Hemroulle with the in-<br />
tention of circling through Savy into<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. This force wedged its way be-<br />
tween the two right flank companies of<br />
the 327th but w<strong>as</strong> caught in the open by<br />
the howitzers m<strong>as</strong>sed west of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
which literally blew the infantry <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
apart. Four armored tank destroyers con-<br />
tinued toward Hemroulle but were<br />
finally brought to a halt by a large ditch.<br />
Here, while maneuvering, all were put<br />
out of action by artillery and tank de-<br />
stroyer fire at close range.<br />
In midafternoon more bad news<br />
reached Kokott’s command post. He had<br />
counted on the 5th Parachute Division<br />
to keep Patton’s armor at bay in the<br />
south, and to make doubly certain had<br />
faced parts of the 901st and 39th away<br />
from B<strong>as</strong>togne in support of the para-<br />
troopers. Now word came that the 5th<br />
Parachute Division had broken and<br />
that the 39th Regiment w<strong>as</strong> under at-<br />
tack. Kokott had little to give the<br />
39th, only five or six tanks which<br />
had just been repaired, and he did not<br />
dare put these on the road until dark-<br />
ness sent the American fighter-bombers<br />
home. Both Kokott and the corps com-<br />
mander, Luettwitz, still expected the<br />
main battle to be fought on the Arlon or<br />
Neufchâteau road, but in the late after-<br />
noon the commander of the 39th radioed<br />
that American tanks had broken through<br />
farther to the west at Assenois. Kokott<br />
<strong>as</strong>ked Luettwitz for help, but the latter<br />
had empty hands. Late that night new<br />
orders came from Field Marshall Model:<br />
the 26th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
would hold the defenders inside the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter until the tanks of<br />
the Fuehrer Begleit Brigade could arrive<br />
to sever the narrow corridor opened to<br />
the defenders that afternoon by the<br />
American armor.<br />
The siege of B<strong>as</strong>togne, for purposes of<br />
historic record, may be considered ended<br />
at 1645 on 26 December when the 326th<br />
Airborne engineers reported contact<br />
with “three light tanks believed<br />
friendly.” True, the breach in the Ger-<br />
man-held ring opened by the 4th<br />
Armored Division w<strong>as</strong> narrow and pre-<br />
carious, but it would not be closed de-<br />
spite the most strenuous enemy efforts<br />
in coming days. The staunch defense of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne had impeded the Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> drive to the west, just <strong>as</strong> the des-<br />
perate rear guard battle by the 7th<br />
Armored at St. Vith had slowed the ad-<br />
vance of the Sixth, demonstrating the<br />
axiom of World War I that no salient<br />
thrust into the defender’s position can<br />
be expanded rapidly and successfully if<br />
the shoulders of the salient are firmly<br />
held by the defender. The human cost<br />
of the B<strong>as</strong>togne battle, t<strong>here</strong>fore, prob-<br />
ably w<strong>as</strong> not out of proportion to the<br />
military gains achieved. The 101st Air-
THE BATTLE OF BASTOGNE 481<br />
borne Division suffered battle c<strong>as</strong>ualties<br />
numbering 105 officers and 1,536 men.<br />
CCB of the 10th Armored Division had<br />
approximately 25 officers and 478 men<br />
<strong>as</strong> battle c<strong>as</strong>ualties. T<strong>here</strong> is no means of<br />
numbering the killed, wounded, and<br />
missing in the miscellany of unrecorded<br />
tankers, gunners, infantry, and others<br />
who shared in the defense of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Nor can any c<strong>as</strong>ualty roster now be com-<br />
piled of those units which fought e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne prior to 19 December and gave<br />
the 101st Airborne Division the time<br />
and the tactical opportunity to array it-<br />
self in the defense of that town.
CHAPTER XX<br />
The XII Corps Attacks the<br />
Southern Shoulder<br />
The End of the Defensive Battle,<br />
22 December<br />
Intercepted radio messages, a most<br />
fruitful source for German intelligence,<br />
had clearly indicated by 19 December<br />
that the Americans were moving rein-<br />
forcements in large numbers toward the<br />
Bulge. The OB WEST staff re<strong>as</strong>oned<br />
that the bulk of these new divisions<br />
would be committed in the west in de-<br />
fense of the Meuse River or along the<br />
north side of the salient. Thus far t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> no cause to be concerned about the<br />
southern flank. The weak Seventh <strong>Army</strong><br />
had made progress, although not so much<br />
<strong>as</strong> Hitler wished, and t<strong>here</strong> were no<br />
signs of change in the defensive attitude<br />
shown by the Americans in this sector.<br />
Late in the evening of the 19th, <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group G reported that the U.S. Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> giving ground on the Saar<br />
front, but the American move w<strong>as</strong> inter-<br />
preted <strong>as</strong> a readjustment which could<br />
not bring Third <strong>Army</strong> reinforcements to<br />
the Ardennes before 22 December. The<br />
German intelligence staffs again agreed<br />
that t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no immediate threat to<br />
the Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, and that the west-<br />
ward advance by the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
would necessarily force the Americans to<br />
strengthen the battle line t<strong>here</strong> and pro-<br />
hibit any thrust into the deep southern<br />
flank.<br />
Although the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> in the<br />
process of going over to the defensive, it<br />
had pushed its right wing forward, ac-<br />
cording to plan, and on 20 December<br />
re-established contact with its northern<br />
neighbor, the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>. In<br />
effect the right wing of the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> had wheeled to face south, while<br />
at the same time elongating the shoulder<br />
of the Fifth. This extension had widened<br />
the gap between the LXXXV Corps, in<br />
the Ettelbruck sector, and the LXXX<br />
Corps, west of Echternach, but <strong>as</strong> yet<br />
the higher German headquarters were<br />
unconcerned about the thinning line.<br />
(See Map V.)<br />
The division and corps commanders of<br />
the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> were less sanguine. By<br />
intuition, or through the natural appre-<br />
hension induced by heavy losses, they<br />
already flinched mentally from the re-<br />
taliatory blow. Concerned with their<br />
own weakness, rather than the strength<br />
and successes of the panzer armies, it<br />
seemed logical to them that the Ameri-<br />
cans would seek to exploit such weak-<br />
ness. 1 Across the lines, <strong>as</strong> it happened,<br />
1 The German sources of greatest use are: the<br />
OB WEST/IC-Tagesmeldungen for this period;<br />
MSS ETHINT–34 (Buecks) ; ETHINT–40, LXXXV<br />
Infantry Corps in the Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive (General<br />
der Infanterie Baptist Kniess) ; ETHINT–51<br />
(Jodl); ETHINT–54, Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, Ardennes<br />
(Generalmajor Rudolf Freiherr von Gersdorff) ;<br />
MSS # A-876 (Brandenberger) ; A–330 and A–931
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 483<br />
plans were in process for a counterattack<br />
against the German southern flank, but<br />
General Patton, charged with this opera-<br />
tion, would not have his troops in readi-<br />
ness before 22 December and feared that<br />
in the interim the enemy would launch<br />
a spoiling attack from the Echternach<br />
area.<br />
With the main weight of the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> echeloned forward on its right<br />
(western) wing, pressure to regain con-<br />
tact and to grapple with the 109th<br />
Infantry w<strong>as</strong> stepped up during the night<br />
of 20 December. The 352d Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division pushed through Ettelbruck<br />
and probed cautiously in the dark,<br />
searching to the west and south for the<br />
outlines of the 109th’s new position.<br />
This advance onto the ridge rising in<br />
the triangle formed by the Wark Creek<br />
and Alzette River had a limited object.<br />
Luxembourg, an appetizing target, lay<br />
only fifteen miles south of Ettelbruck<br />
and on a good road, but the orders re-<br />
ceived by the 352d aimed solely at the<br />
quick acquisition of a good blocking<br />
position against any American riposte<br />
from the south. The objective of the<br />
352d, t<strong>here</strong>fore, w<strong>as</strong> a line b<strong>as</strong>ed on the<br />
villages of Bettborn and Bissen that<br />
would cut the main roads running north<br />
and northe<strong>as</strong>t from Luxembourg and<br />
Arlon, respectively. Parts of two regi-<br />
ments, the 914th and 916th, went up<br />
against the outpost positions of<br />
the 109th Infantry on 21 Decem-<br />
ber, gaining ground on both of<br />
the open flanks. For the Americans the<br />
fight w<strong>as</strong> one to gain time (they per-<br />
(Sensfuss); B–029. LIII Corps, 8 December 1944-<br />
21 January 1945 (General der Kavallerie Edwin<br />
Graf Rothkirch); B–030 (Kniess) ; B–067<br />
(Schmidt) ; B–073 (Sensfuss) ; B–081 (Beyer) ; P-<br />
032f (Dempwolff).<br />
mitted no serious penetration of the<br />
ridge position overlooking the Wark<br />
valley) until, on the morning of 22 De-<br />
cember, troops of the incoming 80th<br />
Infantry Division headed north through<br />
their positions.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the south and e<strong>as</strong>t the 276th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, now some distance<br />
from the 352d, re-formed its two leading<br />
regiments on a common front and<br />
worked feverishly to bring artillery am-<br />
munition and supplies forward from<br />
bridges which at long l<strong>as</strong>t were in opera-<br />
tion. It appears that the new division<br />
commander of the 276th had ordered a<br />
limited attack for 21 December, intended<br />
to carry from Waldbillig to Christnach<br />
and the more readily defended creek line<br />
t<strong>here</strong>. Late on the previous day a few<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns, probably no more than five<br />
or six, had arrived west of the river.<br />
These weapons, it w<strong>as</strong> hoped, would<br />
lend the tired German infantry the<br />
necessary punch.<br />
In the 9th Armored Division (-)<br />
sector plans were under way to retake<br />
Waldbillig, using T<strong>as</strong>k Force Chamber-<br />
lain of the 10th Armored Division, which<br />
had been reorganized with a strength of<br />
thirteen medium tanks and two much<br />
understrength armored infantry com-<br />
panies (total: 130 men). Before the<br />
German attack got under way on 21<br />
December T<strong>as</strong>k Force Chamberlain at-<br />
tacked toward Waldbillig. The Sher-<br />
mans, protected by tank destroyers over-<br />
watching on the flanks, negotiated the<br />
dangerous skyline crossing on the ridge<br />
between Christnach and Waldbillig and<br />
by noon were in Waldbillig.<br />
Reports that the enemy had with-<br />
drawn proved erroneous the moment<br />
that the supporting infantry started to<br />
move up with the tanks. Mortar and rifle
484 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
fire burst from the village, while Werfers<br />
in the neighboring woods joined in.<br />
Although the infantry support had a<br />
bad time, the tanks were little concerned<br />
by this enemy action. Their presence<br />
inside the village had some effect: a<br />
hundred prisoners were taken from the<br />
988th. About midnight the American<br />
artillery laid on a brief, sharp concentra-<br />
tion and the few tanks still in Waldbillig<br />
made a rapid withdrawal. Then Ameri-<br />
cans and Germans both shelled the<br />
village, by now a kind of no man’s land.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the e<strong>as</strong>t, opposite the weakest<br />
portion of the 4th Infantry Division line,<br />
the 212th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
made still another effort to reach its<br />
original objective–the good defensive<br />
terrain and blocking position in the<br />
Consdorf-Scheidgen-Michelshof area. In<br />
the afternoon of 21 December the 212th<br />
Fuesilier Battalion moved along the<br />
main Echternach-Luxembourg road<br />
through Lauterborn, which the Ameri-<br />
cans earlier had abandoned. Just ahead<br />
lay Hill 313, overlooking the road south.<br />
Here a part of Company C, 159th Engi-<br />
neer Combat Battalion, w<strong>as</strong> stationed,<br />
with Company B occupying a smaller<br />
hill just to the west. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no pro-<br />
tection for the engineer flanks. About<br />
1300 the Germans started a 30-minute<br />
shelling, covering their advance through<br />
the draws fringing the American-held<br />
heights.<br />
Company B caught the full force of<br />
the first <strong>as</strong>sault, the grenadiers erupting<br />
from the draws, firing their burp guns,<br />
and shouting in broken English, “Kill<br />
the sons of bitches.” Two platoons fell<br />
back from Company B onto Company<br />
C, which in turn came under attack by<br />
Germans who had worked around Hill<br />
313 and threatened to cut the road back<br />
to Scheidgen. The engineers had no<br />
working radios and did not know that<br />
reinforcements in the shape of a hundred<br />
or so men from the division headquarters<br />
company were on the way. Actually this<br />
relief party had to fight its way forward<br />
<strong>as</strong> the engineers struggled to clear a path<br />
back, and darkness w<strong>as</strong> coming when the<br />
two bodies made contact. Almost out of<br />
ammunition, the engineers fell back to<br />
Scheidgen, but the Germans made no<br />
move to follow.<br />
While the fusilier battalion w<strong>as</strong> gain-<br />
ing ground in its drive toward Scheidgen,<br />
other troops of the 212th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division were trying, albeit with<br />
less success, to make headway to the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
and west. Assembling in the woods near<br />
Rodenhof, the 320th Grenadier Regi-<br />
ment launched an attack to take Os-<br />
weiler, but ran into two companies of<br />
the 2d Battalion, 22d Infantry, en route<br />
to clean out the woods. Neither side w<strong>as</strong><br />
able to advance and the Americans dug<br />
in for the night a few hundred yards<br />
south of Rodenhof. On the left flank of<br />
the 12th Infantry sector a sharp fight<br />
flared up in midafternoon when two<br />
companies of the 423d Grenadier Regi-<br />
ment tried to take Consdorf. The Amer-<br />
ican tanks and infantry held their fire<br />
until the enemy <strong>as</strong>sault formation had<br />
cleared its <strong>as</strong>sembly area in the woods<br />
and w<strong>as</strong> fully deployed on the bare slope<br />
before the town. Then they cut loose.<br />
Some sixty Germans were killed and the<br />
rest withdrew.<br />
The 212th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
made a l<strong>as</strong>t attempt to expand the gains<br />
achieved in the Scheidgen sector on 22<br />
December, the date on which the<br />
American counterattack finally began. A<br />
stealthy advance through the draws be-<br />
tween the Americans occupying the
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 485<br />
villages of Scheidgen and Michelshof<br />
during the early afternoon w<strong>as</strong> perceived<br />
and handily checked by shellfire. At dusk<br />
the Germans tried again, debouching<br />
from the central ravine in a wedge for-<br />
mation. This effort w<strong>as</strong> suicidal. Tanks,<br />
tank destroyers, artillery, engineers,<br />
and infantry were all in position and<br />
watching the draw like hungry cats in<br />
front of a mouse hole. The German<br />
point w<strong>as</strong> only a hundred yards from the<br />
American foxholes when the first Ameri-<br />
can fired. When the fusillade ended, 142<br />
dead and dying Germans were left on<br />
the snow, still in their wedge formation.<br />
One lone grenadier, with five bullet<br />
holes in him, came forward with his<br />
hands held shakily over his head.<br />
This bootless enemy effort on 22<br />
December w<strong>as</strong> no more than a counter-<br />
attack to cover a general withdrawal<br />
which the 212th had begun the night<br />
before on corps orders. The defensive<br />
period for Americans in the Sauer sector<br />
in fact had closed with darkness on 21<br />
December. This six-day battle had given<br />
adequate proof of General Barton’s<br />
dictum, “The best way to handle these<br />
Heinies is to fight ’em.” It w<strong>as</strong> a battle<br />
fought off the cuff in a situation which<br />
mimeographed periodic reports would<br />
call “fluid” but which, for the most,<br />
could better be described <strong>as</strong> “obscure”<br />
seen from either side of the<br />
The XII Corps Moues to<br />
Luxembourg<br />
Three days before the beginning of<br />
the German thrust into the Ardennes,<br />
2 See Chapter X, p<strong>as</strong>sim, and the American rec-<br />
ords cited t<strong>here</strong>in. 1st Lt. Edgar C. Heist, Com-<br />
pany D, 70th Tank Battalion, so distinguished<br />
himself that he w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC. He w<strong>as</strong><br />
killed on 22 December.<br />
General Patton and Maj. Gen. Hoyt S.<br />
Vandenberg met to discuss plans for a<br />
combined air and ground attack to<br />
sm<strong>as</strong>h through the German West Wall-<br />
target date, 19 December. After three or<br />
four days of intense bombing by the<br />
Ninth Air Force and the Royal Air<br />
Force, Maj. Gen. Manton S. Eddy’s XII<br />
Corps would attack from the Saar River<br />
to penetrate the West Wall and start the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong>, stymied by mud, reinforced<br />
GENERAL EDDY<br />
concrete, and the w<strong>as</strong>ting effect of the<br />
p<strong>as</strong>t battles of attrition, once again on the<br />
way to the Rhine. Patton w<strong>as</strong> jubilant<br />
at the prospect of the biggest blitz (so he<br />
fondly referred to the planned air <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault) in the Third <strong>Army</strong>’s history. Gen-<br />
eral Eisenhower, however, did not con-<br />
ceive of the attack in the Saar sector <strong>as</strong><br />
the major Allied effort and had decided<br />
“regardless of [the] results,” to transfer<br />
divisions from this sector, once the attack<br />
had been made, to the north for the
486 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
major <strong>as</strong>sault against the Rhine and<br />
Germany itself.<br />
Meanwhile the XII Corps had the t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
of cleaning out the German positions in<br />
the small forests and wood lots between<br />
the Saar and the West Wall so that no<br />
entanglement in these outworks would<br />
dull the full shock of the hard blow<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> being readied. For this mis-<br />
sion General Eddy employed two infan-<br />
try divisions, the new 87th and the<br />
veteran 35th, their attack to begin on 16<br />
December.<br />
The fighting w<strong>as</strong> extremely bitter, and<br />
the enemy made the Americans pay<br />
dearly for each yard gained toward the<br />
West Wall. The superiority of the at-<br />
tacker in men and materiel, however, <strong>as</strong><br />
usual w<strong>as</strong> clearing the field, a fact of<br />
battlefield life that w<strong>as</strong> all too evident to<br />
the German defenders. On the night of<br />
16 December the commander of the XC<br />
Corps, facing Eddy’s divisions, warned<br />
his superiors that the German line w<strong>as</strong><br />
so thin and ragged that if the Americans<br />
decided on an all-out attack neither the<br />
existing battle line nor the West Wall<br />
could be held. But in this instance the<br />
calculated risk <strong>as</strong>sumed by Hitler in<br />
stripping the <strong>Army</strong> Group G sector to<br />
feed troops and weapons into <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group B paid off. It turned out that the<br />
battered and weakened German divi-<br />
sions in front of the XII Corps had done<br />
their job, had held long enough.<br />
<strong>To</strong> take the pressure off the XII Corps<br />
infantry Patton w<strong>as</strong> preparing to bolster<br />
the attack with the 6th Armored Division<br />
when General Bradley informed the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> commander of the day’s<br />
happenings on the VIII Corps front. The<br />
army group commander ordered that<br />
the 10th Armored be dispatched to Mid-<br />
dleton forthwith, this move from the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> to begin on the 17th. Gen-<br />
eral Morris started his division north,<br />
and Patton canceled the 6th Armored<br />
attack which had been poised in front of<br />
Forbach–one of the few occ<strong>as</strong>ions on<br />
which the Third <strong>Army</strong> commander<br />
called off an attack that he personally<br />
had ordered. So far <strong>as</strong> the Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
staff knew at this stage, however, the<br />
German blow in the Ardennes presented<br />
no dire threat and the attack on the 19th<br />
would go <strong>as</strong> scheduled.<br />
But on 18 December Bradley called<br />
Patton to his Luxembourg headquarters,<br />
and t<strong>here</strong> Patton learned for the first<br />
time of the grave situation faced by the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong>. When <strong>as</strong>ked what help he<br />
could give, the Third <strong>Army</strong> commander<br />
replied that he could intervene in the<br />
battle with three divisions “very shortly.”<br />
He telephoned the Third <strong>Army</strong> chief of<br />
staff to stop the XII Corps attack form-<br />
ing for the following day and to prepare<br />
the 4th Armored and 80th Infantry Divi-<br />
sions for immediate transfer to Luxem-<br />
bourg. The 87th Division halted its slow<br />
advance, <strong>as</strong> did the 35th. On the move<br />
out of rest area for <strong>as</strong>sembly in prepara-<br />
tion for the XII Corps’ attack, the 4th<br />
Armored and 80th likewise stopped.<br />
When it became apparent by nightfall<br />
of the 18th that the situation on the First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> front had deteriorated beyond<br />
expectation, General Bradley decided<br />
upon immediate use of the Third <strong>Army</strong>’s<br />
resources. Patton had returned to his<br />
command post at Nancy when, a couple<br />
of hours before midnight, Bradley called<br />
with word that conditions on the VIII<br />
Corps front were much worse, that the<br />
troops promised by the Third <strong>Army</strong> had<br />
to move at once, and that Patton w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
attend a meeting with the Supreme Com-<br />
mander the following morning at Ver-
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 487<br />
dun. By midnight one combat command<br />
of the 4th Armored Division w<strong>as</strong> on its<br />
way north to Longwy; at dawn on the<br />
19th the 80th Infantry Division had<br />
started for Luxembourg City. And<br />
through the night before the Verdun<br />
meeting the Third <strong>Army</strong> staff worked<br />
feverishly to draft plans for the inter-<br />
vention of all or any part of Patton's<br />
forces in the battle raging in the north,<br />
for Bradley had intimated that Patton<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to take command of the VIII Corps<br />
and other forces moving to its <strong>as</strong>sistance.<br />
Bradley already had directed that the<br />
III Corps headquarters would be moved<br />
from Metz to take command of an attack<br />
to be mounted somew<strong>here</strong> north of<br />
Luxembourg City. Patton's general staff,<br />
GENERAL PATTON<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore, prepared three plans for a<br />
counterattack: on the axes Neufchâteau<br />
–St. Hubert; Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne; and Lux-<br />
embourg-Diekirch–St. Vith. The final<br />
attack selected would, <strong>as</strong> Patton then<br />
saw it, be delivered by the VIII and III<br />
Corps. When Patton arrived at Verdun<br />
on the morning of the 19th, Eisenhower<br />
<strong>as</strong>ked how soon the III Corps could<br />
launch its counterattack. Patton replied<br />
that he could start a piecemeal attack in<br />
three days, a co-ordinated attack in six.<br />
The Supreme Commander, who seems<br />
to have felt that Patton w<strong>as</strong> a bit too<br />
confident, subsequently informed Field<br />
Marshal Montgomery that the counter-<br />
attack from the south would be made on<br />
the 23d or 24th. 3<br />
The m<strong>as</strong>ter plan outlined by Eisen-<br />
hower in the Verdun meeting of the 19th<br />
turned on a major effort to plug the<br />
holes developing in the north and the<br />
launching of a co-ordinated attack from<br />
the south. <strong>To</strong> free the force needed for<br />
this initial counterattack, Eisenhower<br />
ordered all offensive operations south of<br />
the Moselle to be halted forthwith and<br />
turned over the entire Third <strong>Army</strong> sec-<br />
tor (except for that occupied by Maj.<br />
Gem. Walton H. Walker's XX Corps on<br />
the border of the Saar) to General<br />
Devers' 6th <strong>Army</strong> Group. This north-<br />
ward extension of Devers' command<br />
would spread the American forces in<br />
Alsace and Lorraine rather thin, but<br />
Devers (who w<strong>as</strong> present at the Verdun<br />
meeting on the 19th) w<strong>as</strong> promised some<br />
of the Third <strong>Army</strong> divisions and artil-<br />
lery.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> now clear that Patton would<br />
be responsible for a major effort to knife<br />
into the German southern flank, that he<br />
would have at le<strong>as</strong>t two of the three<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> corps, six of its divisions,<br />
3 See below, Chapter XXI, note 2, for documen-<br />
tary sources relating to Patton and the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong>.
488 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
and the bulk of the army troops for the<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k. (On 20 December, however, after<br />
a visit to Middleton’s command post,<br />
Patton found that the VIII Corps w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
such shape that it could not be used<br />
offensively and that the two Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
corps would have to carry the ball.) A<br />
telephone call from Verdun, using a<br />
simple code which had been arranged<br />
before Patton left Nancy, informed the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> chief of staff (Brig. Gen.<br />
Hobart R. Gay) that the XII Corps w<strong>as</strong><br />
to disengage at once, that the command<br />
post of Eddy’s corps and an advance<br />
command post for the Third <strong>Army</strong> were<br />
to transfer to Luxembourg City, that the<br />
26th Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong> to start north<br />
on the following morning, and that the<br />
35th Infantry Division–which had been<br />
in the line for 160 consecutive days–w<strong>as</strong><br />
to be relieved <strong>as</strong> quickly <strong>as</strong> possible and<br />
be sent to Metz for much needed re-<br />
habilitation en route to the Ardennes<br />
battle. At midnight of the 20th, the XIII<br />
Corps front w<strong>as</strong> taken over by its south-<br />
ern neighbor, Maj. Gen. Wade H. Hais-<br />
lip’s XV Corps. The 4th Armored and<br />
80th Infantry Divisions had that day<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed to the command of the III Corps<br />
in the Arlon sector south of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The next morning General Eddy and<br />
his immediate staff departed for Luxem-<br />
bourg with a new mission: to <strong>as</strong>sume<br />
command of the American troops north<br />
and e<strong>as</strong>t of Luxembourg City who had<br />
Held so tenaciously along the southern<br />
shoulder of the original German pene-<br />
tration. General Eddy’s new command,<br />
<strong>as</strong>ide from corps troops, consisted of<br />
those units already in the area and the<br />
5th Infantry Division, which had been<br />
added to the roster of Third <strong>Army</strong> for-<br />
mations rolling northward. It moved in<br />
piecemeal <strong>as</strong> it w<strong>as</strong> relieved from the<br />
XX Corps’ bridgehead at Saarlautern. 4<br />
The troops in the line when Eddy took<br />
over were the 4th Infantry Division, the<br />
10th Armored Division (less CCB),<br />
CCA of the 9th Armored Division, the<br />
109th Infantry, and other smaller units<br />
of the 28th Infantry Division. (Map IX)<br />
When the XII Corps took control of<br />
its new zone on the 21st, the German<br />
thrust into e<strong>as</strong>tern Luxembourg had<br />
been pretty well checked. The three<br />
German divisions which the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> had thrown into the initial attack<br />
were dr<strong>as</strong>tically depleted by then and<br />
apprehensive that the Americans might<br />
undertake a counterattack in such force<br />
<strong>as</strong> to penetrate this part of the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong>’s blocking position on the south-<br />
ern flank of the German salient. The<br />
Americans likewise were concerned lest<br />
the enemy make a l<strong>as</strong>t major try for a<br />
breakthrough before the promised rein-<br />
forcement arrived from the Third <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong>, however, a fairly continu-<br />
ous-although jagged–line of defense<br />
confronting the enemy. The new corps’<br />
front, facing e<strong>as</strong>t and north, reached<br />
from Dickweiler, near the west bank of<br />
the Sauer River, to Schieren, on the Al-<br />
zette River, due north of Luxembourg<br />
City. The e<strong>as</strong>tern wing w<strong>as</strong> defended<br />
by the 4th Infantry Division and t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
forces from the 10th Armored Division.<br />
The northern wing w<strong>as</strong> held by the<br />
109th Infantry and CCA, 9th Armored<br />
Division, backed by detachments from<br />
the 10th Armored. This wing, at its<br />
4 The combat interviews with the XII Corps<br />
provide an enlightening account of the problems<br />
encountered in the Third <strong>Army</strong> ninety-degree<br />
wheel to the north. See also the XII Corps AAR<br />
and G–3 journal. The semiofficial history of the<br />
XII Corps is Lt. Col. George Dyer’s XII Corps:<br />
Spearhead of Patton’s Third <strong>Army</strong> (Baton Rouge:<br />
<strong>Military</strong> Press of Louisiana, n.d.), ch. 11, p<strong>as</strong>sim.
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER<br />
western tip, had been wide open. But<br />
the 80th Infantry Division of the III<br />
Corps w<strong>as</strong> moving in to establish an ex-<br />
tension of the American line beyond the<br />
Alzette and on the 22d deployed to<br />
envelop the enemy bridgehead west of<br />
Ettelbruck.<br />
General Patton intended to give Gen-<br />
eral Eddy two infantry divisions from<br />
the old Third <strong>Army</strong> front, the 5th and<br />
35th. The latter had seen very rough<br />
fighting; it would need some refitting<br />
and for this re<strong>as</strong>on had been ordered to<br />
Metz to reorganize before rejoining the<br />
XII Corps. Maj. Gen. S. LeRoy Irwin’s<br />
5th Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong> in good condi-<br />
tion. Introduced into Walker’s XX<br />
Corps bridgehead at Saarlautern to re-<br />
lieve the 95th Division, two of Irwin’s<br />
regiments had attacked on 18 and 19<br />
December to widen the breach made ear-<br />
lier in the main bunker lines of the<br />
forward West Wall position. General<br />
Irwin, however, had some inkling that<br />
his division might soon leave the bridge-<br />
head for on the night of the 19th the<br />
corps commander warned that the attack<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to be held up, that the situation in<br />
the north w<strong>as</strong> very much confused and<br />
that the 5th Division might be moved in<br />
that direction. The 10th Infantry divi-<br />
sion reserve w<strong>as</strong> put on one-hour alert to<br />
move “in any direction.”<br />
General Walker arrived at Irwin’s<br />
command post toward noon of the fol-<br />
lowing day. He told Irwin that one reg-<br />
iment of the 95th would relieve the 5th<br />
Division in the bridgehead and that the<br />
XX Corps w<strong>as</strong> pulling back across the<br />
Saar except in one small bridgehead. As<br />
to the future employment of the 5th Di-<br />
vision he had no word. More precise<br />
directions shortly came from the corps<br />
headquarters, moving the 10th Infantry,<br />
489<br />
the 8 18th Tank Destroyer Battalion, and<br />
the 735th Tank Battalion toward Thi-<br />
onville on the Luxembourg road. The<br />
next order bade Irwin bring his 11th<br />
Infantry out of the bridgehead during<br />
the night.<br />
The withdrawal of the tank and tank<br />
destroyer battalions, each of which had<br />
two companies west of the river, went<br />
forward by ferry in full daylight; by 1700<br />
these battalions were on the road to<br />
Luxembourg. The relief of the 11th In-<br />
fantry, by an extension of the 2d Infantry<br />
sector, began <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> darkness settled.<br />
It went well also, only two c<strong>as</strong>ualties<br />
being incurred. By 1000 the next morn-<br />
ing the entire regiment w<strong>as</strong> in trucks en<br />
route to Thionville. The enemy w<strong>as</strong><br />
neither in strength nor in frame of mind<br />
able to interfere with the American<br />
withdrawal, although the 2d Infantry<br />
attempt to hide the reduction of the line<br />
by incre<strong>as</strong>ed fire fooled the Germans not<br />
one whit. Relieved on the night of 21<br />
December by troops of the 95th Division,<br />
the 2d Infantry w<strong>as</strong> already rolling to<br />
join its sister regiments when the morn-<br />
ing fog blew away.<br />
The XII Corps’ Counterattack<br />
That same morning the 10th Infantry<br />
initiated the 5th Division fight on a new<br />
battleground. 5 Despite confusion, frag-<br />
The 5th Infantry Division, <strong>as</strong> one would expect<br />
of an old line outfit, maintained very good records.<br />
General Irwin also made his personal diary avail-<br />
able to the author. All three of the infantry<br />
regiments published official accounts: <strong>History</strong> of<br />
the Second Infantry Regiment, <strong>History</strong> of the<br />
Tenth Infantry Regiment, <strong>History</strong> of the Eleventh<br />
Infantry Regiment (All Baton Rouge: <strong>Army</strong> and<br />
Navy Publishing Company, 1946). The journals<br />
maintained by each of the rifle battalions are<br />
particularly useful.
490 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
mentary orders, and a general sense that<br />
the leading columns of the division were<br />
moving toward an unknown destination<br />
and enemy, the 10th Infantry (Col.<br />
Robert P. Bell) transfer to Luxembourg<br />
had been accomplished in good time.<br />
Two officers of Irwin’s staff reached the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> headquarters in Luxem-<br />
bourg at 1730 on 20 December and t<strong>here</strong><br />
received an <strong>as</strong>sembly area for the regi-<br />
ment and some maps. Hurrying back<br />
down the Thionville road the staff of-<br />
ficers met the column, blacked out but<br />
moving at a good clip. In the early<br />
evening the column rolled through the<br />
streets of Luxembourg City, and an hour<br />
or so after midnight the first trucks drove<br />
into the <strong>as</strong>sembly area near Rammel-<br />
dange. Then the column closed, the in-<br />
fantry shivering out the rest of the night<br />
in the trucks. 6<br />
The mission of the 5th Infantry Di-<br />
vision had not yet been defined, but it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> clear that it had moved from one<br />
battle to another. A series of meetings in<br />
Luxembourg during the morning of the<br />
2 1st resulted in the decision to place the<br />
5th Division north of the city in the sec-<br />
tor briefly occupied by the 80th Division.<br />
6 Combat interview and General Irwin’s diary.<br />
The move of the 10th Infantry seems to have<br />
gone according to plan only in its first stages. Lt.<br />
Col. Donald W. Thackeray, the division G–2,<br />
and Lt. Col. George K. Moody, <strong>as</strong>sistant G–3,<br />
were told by the Third <strong>Army</strong> staff that the<br />
regiment would go into <strong>as</strong>sembly area in the<br />
vicinity of Rammeldange but that the 10th<br />
Armored would provide guides and prepare<br />
billets at the bivouac point. Apparently the 10th<br />
Armored did not get the word, and the skeleton<br />
staff in Luxembourg made no plans for the re-<br />
ception of the 10th Infantry until an officer from<br />
the 5th Division literally stumbled upon the 10th<br />
Armored forward command post. As a result the<br />
incoming infantry were put on the road to<br />
Rammeldange but no billets were provided. See<br />
Ltr, Maj Gen William M. Breckenridge to OCMH,<br />
30 Nov 60.<br />
Further, the XII Corps commander<br />
told General Irwin to be prepared to<br />
attack north or northe<strong>as</strong>t, or to counter-<br />
attack in the southe<strong>as</strong>t. Later General<br />
Eddy warned that the 10th Infantry<br />
might have to go into the line that very<br />
afternoon to help the 12th Infantry re-<br />
store the American positions south of<br />
Echternach. The 10th did move forward<br />
to Ernzen, but no counterattack order<br />
w<strong>as</strong> forthcoming.<br />
In the meantime the 11th Infantry<br />
arrived in Luxembourg City, its mis-<br />
sion to take over the 80th Division posi-<br />
tion north of the city between Ernzen<br />
and Reuland and cover the deployment<br />
of the XII Corps-a rather large order<br />
for a regimental combat team. However<br />
the regimental commander, Col. Paul J.<br />
Black, w<strong>as</strong> forced to halt his column<br />
when the 80th Division commander gave<br />
him a direct order to keep off the road<br />
net then being used by the 80th for a<br />
shift west into the III Corps’ sector. The<br />
regimental S-3 later reported that the<br />
80th Division had used the roads only<br />
intermittently during the afternoon and<br />
that the 11th Infantry could have moved<br />
north without difficulty. But on the other<br />
hand Maj. Gen. Horace L. McBride had<br />
orders to attack the next morning, and<br />
the Third <strong>Army</strong> commander, <strong>as</strong> he very<br />
well knew, would brook no delay. In any<br />
c<strong>as</strong>e the halt of the 111th Infantry on the<br />
north edge of the city did create a mam-<br />
moth road jam.<br />
During the evening General Eddy met<br />
his commanders at the 4th Division com-<br />
mand post. Reports coming in from the<br />
12 th Infantry, holding the weakest sec-<br />
tion of the 4th Division front, were dis-<br />
couraging, for that afternoon the 212th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division had made<br />
substantial progress in an attack along
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 491<br />
5TH INFANTRY DIVISION TROOPS MNG TOWARD THE FRONT<br />
the main road leading from Echternach<br />
toward Luxembourg City. Although the<br />
12th Infantry line had hardened and<br />
now held near Scheidgen, General Bar-<br />
ton expected that the enemy would try<br />
another punch down the road. But, even<br />
while the American commanders were<br />
meeting, the German LXXX Corps staff<br />
w<strong>as</strong> drafting orders for a piecemeal with-<br />
drawal by the 212th Yolks Grenadier<br />
Division to begin that very night.<br />
The enemy gains on 21 December<br />
marked the high tide of the advance over<br />
the Sauer begun six days before, a fact<br />
that could not yet be appreciated by the<br />
little group of commanders gat<strong>here</strong>d in<br />
the 4th Division command post. General<br />
Irwin probably summed up what all<br />
were thinking: “Situation on whole front<br />
from e<strong>as</strong>t of us to north varies from fluid<br />
to no front at all. Information is very<br />
scanty and the situation changes hourly.”<br />
Under these circumstances General Eddy<br />
decided that the 10th Infantry should be<br />
placed under tactical control of the 4th<br />
Division and attack around noon the<br />
following day to restore the situation on<br />
the 12th Infantry front.<br />
Admittedly this w<strong>as</strong> the kind of par-<br />
tial solution frowned upon by the field<br />
service regulations. General Irwin noted,<br />
“I anticipate too much. piecemeal action<br />
for a while to get any tangible results.”<br />
But the 4th Division had undergone six
492 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
days of heavy fighting, its l<strong>as</strong>t reserves<br />
had been used up, and the events of the<br />
day just ended seemed to presage a hard-<br />
ening of the enemy’s resolve.<br />
The critical section of the main line<br />
of resistance w<strong>as</strong> that marked by the vil-<br />
lages of Scheidgen, Michelshof, and Os-<br />
weiler. Here the line w<strong>as</strong> defended by<br />
elements of the 1st and 3d Battalions,<br />
12th Infantry, the regimental antitank<br />
company, and part of the 159th Engineer<br />
Battalion. During the afternoon of the<br />
21st the 212th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
had used one rifle regiment and the divi-<br />
sional fusilier battalion (both at low<br />
strength) in the attempt to take the<br />
three villages and the commanding<br />
ground on which they stood, ground that<br />
represented the final objective of<br />
the 212th. General Barton, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
planned to meet the German threat by<br />
sending the 10th Infantry into attack<br />
<strong>as</strong>tride the road from Michelshof to<br />
Echternach, the two attack battalions<br />
jumping off at noon from the crossroad<br />
Scheidgen-Michelshof. This line of de-<br />
parture w<strong>as</strong> occupied by two rifle com-<br />
panies, four tanks, and five platoons of<br />
engineers.<br />
Through the morning of the 22d en-<br />
emy batteries busily shelled the area just<br />
behind the American positions. The<br />
attack by the 1st and 2d Battalions of the<br />
10th Infantry never really got going. The<br />
2d Battalion on the left of the road de-<br />
ployed some three hundred yards behind<br />
the <strong>as</strong>signed line of departure and<br />
started forward just <strong>as</strong> the Germans be-<br />
gan an <strong>as</strong>sault against the small force<br />
dug in on the line. German guns sup-<br />
porting the grenadiers made any<br />
movement in formation impossible. As it<br />
w<strong>as</strong>, the bulk of the two fresh companies<br />
reached the line about the same time<br />
that the German <strong>as</strong>sault waves struck.<br />
The troops on the line were able to beat<br />
the enemy back, but not before the 2d<br />
Battalion troops had been deflected to<br />
the right and left by the enemy onrush.<br />
Considerably disorganized, the two com-<br />
panies hurriedly dug in just to the south<br />
of the original American covering force.<br />
On the right of the road the 1st Bat-<br />
talion w<strong>as</strong> faced with thick woods and<br />
very rough ground. During the morning<br />
reconnaissance parties had come forward<br />
to look over the route of advance but<br />
had been foiled by a thick ground fog<br />
and alert enemy gunners. When the bat-<br />
talion deployed for the advance to the<br />
line of departure it ran into trouble, for<br />
the company next to the road came un-<br />
der the artillery concentration laid down<br />
in support of the German <strong>as</strong>sault just<br />
described and suffered a number of<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties. Control in woods and ravines<br />
w<strong>as</strong> difficult and the company drifted<br />
across the road behind the 2d Battalion.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> growing dark when the 1st Battal-<br />
ion finally reorganized and dug in, still<br />
short of the line of departure. The in-<br />
tense artillery and Werfer fire by enemy<br />
gunners throughout the day, together<br />
with the infantry <strong>as</strong>sault of the after-<br />
noon, had been designed to cover the<br />
212th Volks Grenadier Division while it<br />
withdrew from the exposed position in<br />
the Scheidgen salient. Fresh American<br />
reinforcements had been held in check;<br />
the German withdrawal had been<br />
successful.<br />
General Eddy telephoned General<br />
Irwin during the evening to say that he<br />
planned to use the 5th Division <strong>as</strong> part<br />
of a corps attack to drive the Germans<br />
back over the Sauer in the angle formed<br />
by the Sauer and Moselle Rivers. Irwin’s<br />
whole division w<strong>as</strong> in Luxembourg but
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 493<br />
somewhat dispersed. The 11th Infantry<br />
had taken over the reserve battle posi-<br />
tions north of Luxembourg City for-<br />
merly occupied by the 80th Division.<br />
The 2d Infantry, having left the XX<br />
Corps’ bridgehead with only minor inci-<br />
dent,’ w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembled around Junglinster,<br />
ready with trucks and attached tank<br />
destroyers for use <strong>as</strong> the corps’ mobile<br />
reserve. Given time to <strong>as</strong>semble, the<br />
fresh 5th Division could take over from<br />
Barton’s battle-weary 4th. That night<br />
Irwin and his staff pored over maps and<br />
march orders for the attack to clear the<br />
enemy from the near side of the Sauer,<br />
an attack scheduled for the morning of<br />
24 December.<br />
In the interim the two battalions of<br />
the 10th Infantry began their second day<br />
of action, a clear day but bitter cold with<br />
snow underfoot. On the right the 1st Bat-<br />
talion made some progress, but one<br />
company lost its way in the heavy woods<br />
and a gap opened between the battalions.<br />
The main difficulty encountered by both<br />
battalions w<strong>as</strong> that of negotiating the<br />
heavy belt of timber which lay to the<br />
front and in which a relatively small<br />
number of the enemy could put up a<br />
fight out of all relation to their actual<br />
strength. Further, the American advance<br />
followed a series of parallel ridge lines:<br />
screened by the woods the Germans<br />
could and did filter along the draws<br />
separating the American companies and<br />
take them on individually.<br />
The 2d Battalion had a particularly<br />
rough time. Company F, which entered<br />
the forest northe<strong>as</strong>t of Michelshof, at<br />
first killed or captured a number of Ger-<br />
mans in snow-covered foxholes just in-<br />
7 The enemy pitched a couple of smoke grenades<br />
into a crowded cellar, causing quick spread of the<br />
rumor that g<strong>as</strong> warfare had begun.<br />
side the woods. Then the German shells<br />
began to burst through the trees. The<br />
company broke into little groups, turn-<br />
ing this way and that to avoid the fire-<br />
many were scooped up by Germans who<br />
had been waiting in their foxholes.<br />
When the company withdrew it num-<br />
bered forty-six men, but later a large<br />
number of stragglers appeared at Mich-<br />
elshof. On the left Company E advanced<br />
until it came under fire from a cross-<br />
grained ridge just ahead. As the com-<br />
pany deployed for the <strong>as</strong>sault a large<br />
force of German infantry erupted from<br />
the draw on its flank, preceded, <strong>as</strong> it<br />
moved, by a curtain of bursting shells.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> plenty of American artillery<br />
on call for such an emergency-six bat-<br />
talions were supporting the 10th Infan-<br />
try attack-and the Germans were dis-<br />
persed. A few tough enemy riflemen dug<br />
in <strong>as</strong> best they could on the frozen<br />
ground and held their place, forcing<br />
Company E to “infiltrate” back to its<br />
take-off position. This day, then, had<br />
been only moderately successful for the<br />
10th Infantry, in part because it w<strong>as</strong><br />
working without the support of its own<br />
5th Division artillery, but the reserve<br />
battalion had not been committed and<br />
the division stood waiting to expand to<br />
attack.<br />
The final field order issued by the<br />
XII Corps called for an attack at 1100<br />
hours on the 24th to seize and hold the<br />
line of the Sauer and Moselle Rivers with<br />
such enemy crossings <strong>as</strong> might remain<br />
intact. The main effort w<strong>as</strong> delegated to<br />
the 5th Infantry Division and the 10th<br />
Armored Division, the latter having ex-<br />
tracted much of its strength from the<br />
line on the left of the 4th Division to<br />
form a counterattack reserve. The 4th<br />
Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong> to hold in place <strong>as</strong>
494 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the 5th p<strong>as</strong>sed through, supporting the<br />
5th’s attack by fire w<strong>here</strong>ver possible.<br />
Finally, the 2d Cavalry Group (rein-<br />
forced), which w<strong>as</strong> just moving into the<br />
new XII Corps area from the old, would<br />
take over the extended Moselle flank on<br />
the right of the corps. This had been a<br />
constant concern to General Barton dur-<br />
ing the 4th Division battles and had<br />
absorbed battalions of the 22d Infantry<br />
badly needed on the fighting line. The<br />
artillery support planned for the attack<br />
included fifteen battalions of corps ar-<br />
tillery plus the organic battalions in the<br />
divisions. The mechanized units avail-<br />
able represented considerable strength:<br />
two combat commands of the 10th Ar-<br />
mored Division with CCA of the 9th<br />
Armored Division attached; two sep-<br />
arate tank battalions; five tank destroyer<br />
battalions, of which three were self-<br />
propelled; and two cavalry squadrons.<br />
The German LXXX Corps faced the<br />
XII Corps with two divisions in the line<br />
anchored on the Sauer and no corps re-<br />
serve. The deep valley of the Schwarz<br />
Erntz remained the boundary between<br />
these divisions, constituting <strong>as</strong> it had in<br />
earlier fighting an ever present physical<br />
obstacle to a homogeneous corps front<br />
and co-ordinated maneuver. On the<br />
right the 276th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> engaged in small-scale attacks<br />
near Savelborn and Christnach. The ex-<br />
treme left or e<strong>as</strong>tern wing of this divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> not solidly anchored, and all<br />
attempts to break out of the Schwarz<br />
Erntz gorge and bring the left forward<br />
in conformity with the advance of the<br />
neighboring division had been thwarted.<br />
The result w<strong>as</strong> that the 212th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, on the right, occu-<br />
pied a south-facing line stepped forward<br />
of the 276th and precariously open at its<br />
western end. <strong>To</strong> cover this gap the 423d<br />
Regiment had spread thin, so thin that<br />
its main line of resistance w<strong>as</strong> little more<br />
than a series of smallish strongpoints. As<br />
a result the LXXX Corps’ order short-<br />
ening the 212th line by withdrawal on<br />
the night of 21 December w<strong>as</strong> issued<br />
with the intention of contracting the<br />
423d to give more body to absorb the<br />
American punches when they came.<br />
The Echternach bridgehead, ex-<br />
panded toward Michelshof, w<strong>as</strong> de-<br />
fended by the 320th Infantry and the<br />
division fusilier battalion. The far left<br />
wing of the division and corps w<strong>as</strong> tied<br />
to the Sauer by the 999th Penal Battal-<br />
ion. On paper, General Sensfuss’ 212th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division had a third<br />
regiment, the 316th, but although this<br />
unit had helped establish the bridgehead<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> reserve and not<br />
even the corps commander could use it<br />
freely. The field replacement battalions<br />
belonging to the LXXX Corps were al-<br />
most completely drained by the heavy<br />
losses incurred in the infantry regiments.<br />
The rifle companies of the two line divi-<br />
sions numbered about forty men apiece.<br />
Each division had only one light and one<br />
medium field artillery battalion in direct<br />
support; the corps had perhaps five bat-<br />
talions, plus one Werfer brigade. Prob-<br />
ably the bulk of this firepower had<br />
displaced across the river to positions di-<br />
rectly behind the divisions. The infantry<br />
companies had fought during the first<br />
days without the aid of <strong>as</strong>sault guns, but<br />
a few of these and two companies of<br />
antitank guns reached the LXXX Corps<br />
just before the American attack on the<br />
24th.<br />
The Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, and more partic-<br />
ularly Beyer’s corps, began the Ardennes<br />
battle <strong>as</strong> the kitchen maid in the scullery
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 495<br />
and would end it in the same status.<br />
Replacements, artillery, armor, and sup-<br />
plies by this stage of the German coun-<br />
teroffensive went first to the two panzer<br />
armies. Since t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> inadequate trans-<br />
port for resupply in the main battle area,<br />
Brandenberger could hardly expect that<br />
additional trucks and critical items<br />
would reach the tactical backwater<br />
w<strong>here</strong> his army w<strong>as</strong> stranded. The Ger-<br />
man commanders on the Sauer front had<br />
recognized <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> the 21st and 22d<br />
that the bolt had been shot; they and<br />
their weary troops knew that the coming<br />
battle already w<strong>as</strong> lost. The ground to<br />
be held, however, generally favored the<br />
defense, just <strong>as</strong> it had favored the Amer-<br />
icans in the first ph<strong>as</strong>e.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> one notable exception-the<br />
natural corridor of the Schwarz Erntz.<br />
This corridor could be used to split the<br />
two German divisions. Moreover, it led<br />
directly to the main corps’ bridge at<br />
Bollendorf and this bridge, if lost, would<br />
leave the bulk of the 276th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division stranded on the west bank<br />
of the Sauer. So seriously w<strong>as</strong> this threat<br />
regarded that on 22 December the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> started work on a heavy<br />
bridge at Dillingen to the rear of the<br />
276th.<br />
The morning of the 24th broke clear<br />
and cold, bringing a mixed blessing. The<br />
thermometer stood below 20º F, and the<br />
American foot sloggers would suffer<br />
(trench foot w<strong>as</strong> commencing to<br />
appear), but the gunners and fighter-<br />
bomber pilots could rejoice. With two<br />
fire direction centers handling the corps<br />
artillery and with perfect visibility at<br />
the observation posts, the battalions fired<br />
salvo after salvo for interdiction and<br />
destruction. A few woods and villages<br />
got special treatment-TOT’S with<br />
white phosphorus, a killing device for<br />
which General Patton had built up some<br />
attachment among troops of the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong>. It seemed to the Americans that<br />
the good shooting by enemy gunners in<br />
the forty-eight hours p<strong>as</strong>t required an<br />
answer; so counterbattery work began<br />
the moment the infantry jumped off in<br />
the attack. During the day and night the<br />
XII Corps artillery would fire 21,173<br />
shells to support the attack on a ten-mile<br />
front. The 5th Division artillery fired<br />
5,813 rounds, exceeding the daily ex-<br />
penditure during the bitter September<br />
battle in the Arnaville bridgehead. Gen-<br />
eral Weyland’s XIX Tactical Air Com-<br />
mand, old friend of the 5th Division,<br />
made good use of beautiful flying weath-<br />
er, but t<strong>here</strong> were many targets to divert<br />
the fighter-bombers beyond the XII<br />
Corps zone. The 405th Fighter Group<br />
flew eight missions during the day, drop-<br />
ping fragmentation and napalm bombs<br />
at points along the Sauer, then strafing<br />
and bombing the roads e<strong>as</strong>t of the river.<br />
At 1100 the ground attack com-<br />
menced. T<strong>here</strong> must have been an<br />
une<strong>as</strong>y feeling that the enemy had<br />
plenty of fight left because the<br />
corps commander told Irwin that<br />
should he feel the attack w<strong>as</strong> prov-<br />
ing too costly it would be called off. Cau-<br />
tion, it may be said, had become less<br />
opprobrious in the Third <strong>Army</strong> since<br />
16 December. The XII Corps G–2, who<br />
like many other intelligence officers had<br />
miscalculated the German ability to re-<br />
sist during the optimistic days of early<br />
September, now estimated that the en-<br />
emy reserves in front of the corps<br />
equaled one infantry and one armored<br />
division. At the same time the American<br />
staffs had an uncertain feeling that the<br />
extremely tenuous connection between
496 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
A WHITE PHOSPHORO<strong>US</strong> BURST during bombardment of German emplacements.<br />
the XII and XX Corps along the Mo-<br />
selle would attract German attention.<br />
The 5th Division began the attack<br />
with three regiments in line on an 8-<br />
mile front reaching from Savelborn on<br />
the west to Osweiler on the e<strong>as</strong>t. From<br />
the line of departure, generally in the<br />
rear of the main line of resistance, Irwin<br />
would feed his battalions into the 10th<br />
Armored line on the left and the 4th<br />
Division line on the right, eventually re-<br />
lieving the latter by extending the 5th<br />
Division wing, lengthened by the 2d<br />
Cavalry Group, to the Sauer. T<strong>as</strong>k forces<br />
of the 10th Armored Division were to<br />
attack on a northern thrust line, clearing<br />
the villages on the south banks of the<br />
Sauer <strong>as</strong> they went. The main effort by<br />
the 5th Division, also looking north,<br />
aimed in its early stages at high ground<br />
overlooking the Echternach bridgehead:<br />
Hill 313 southwest of Lauterborn, the<br />
scene of much bitter fighting when first<br />
the Germans pushed down the road from<br />
Echternach; the ridge south of Berdorf<br />
commanding the Schwarz Erntz gorge:<br />
and, in the old 9th Armored sector north<br />
of the gorge, the plateau and village of<br />
Haller.<br />
On the right of the division the two<br />
battalions of the 10th Infantry continued<br />
their attack north of Michelshof. Along<br />
the thickly wooded ridges to their front<br />
the 320th Infantry, supported by most<br />
of the 212th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
artillery, w<strong>as</strong> concentrated to block the<br />
way to Echternach. The 1st Battalion,<br />
advancing to the right of the Michelshof-
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 497<br />
Echternach highway, once again found<br />
the combination of heavy woods, Ger-<br />
mans in well-disguised foxholes, and<br />
accurate shellfire too much. Two hours<br />
after the attack began the enemy retal-<br />
iated with a counterattack, <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
paving a way for the infantry. The<br />
American gunners quickly disposed of<br />
this. The 2d Battalion, to the west, had<br />
eight medium tanks belonging to the<br />
737th Tank Battalion and less difficult<br />
ground. Four tanks and two platoons of<br />
Company G started along the main road,<br />
covered by other troops advancing on the<br />
ridges to either side of the draw. Shell<br />
bursts on the road and bullet fire soon<br />
drove the troops to the cover of the trees<br />
lining the draw, w<strong>here</strong> others of the bat-<br />
talion were ferreting German riflemen<br />
out of camouflaged foxholes. Smoke fired<br />
to cover the attack gave added momen-<br />
tum; then the tanks destroyed a pair of<br />
machine gun nests on Hill 313. Momen-<br />
tarily, however, the attack wavered when<br />
a part of Company G turned west toward<br />
a hill m<strong>as</strong>s it mistook for its objective.<br />
Brought back, the infantry followed the<br />
tanks to the proper objective. The Ger-<br />
mans t<strong>here</strong> decided not to engage the<br />
Shermans, and by dark the battalion had<br />
Hill 313.<br />
The 2d Infantry sector, in the division<br />
center, extended from the Scheidgen<br />
draw west to the Mullerthal (Schwarz<br />
Erntz) . Immediately to the north lay the<br />
thick forest and rugged ground of the<br />
Kalkesbach, an unsavory obstacle. Col.<br />
A. Worrell Roffe, the 2d Infantry com-<br />
mander, decided to risk a flanking thrust<br />
along the Mullerthal with his 2d Battal-<br />
ion and to use his 3d Battalion in a fron-<br />
tal attack against the Kalkesbach. For the<br />
final punch a tank company and the 1st<br />
Battalion lay waiting in Colbet. If all<br />
went well the regiment would swing on-<br />
to the Berdorf plateau and face e<strong>as</strong>tward<br />
above the Sauer River.<br />
<strong>To</strong> gain entrance to the Mullerthal<br />
w<strong>as</strong> no simple t<strong>as</strong>k. It required an attack<br />
due west down into the draw, w<strong>here</strong> ar-<br />
tillery could be of no help. Companies<br />
F and G undertook the t<strong>as</strong>k, and the<br />
fight became a manhunt, rifleman against<br />
rifleman, stalking one another in crev-<br />
ices, on cliffs, from tree to tree. The<br />
quarry, skillfully hidden, had the best<br />
of it. Company F ran against a strong-<br />
point on a cliff and w<strong>as</strong> the loser in a<br />
fire fight. Company G lost direction sev-<br />
eral times in the maze of cross corridors,<br />
but at every point drew sharp fire. At<br />
dark the two companies dug in against<br />
bullets seemingly whistling in from<br />
every direction. It w<strong>as</strong> evident that the<br />
tree-covered and rocky floor of the gorge<br />
w<strong>as</strong> no place for further attack, and Colo-<br />
nel Roffe ordered the two companies to<br />
fight their way out of the gorge at day-<br />
break. The battalion w<strong>as</strong> then to gather<br />
in an attack on Doster Farm, which over-<br />
looked the road to Berdorf.<br />
The 3d Battalion, north of Scheidgen,<br />
also had hard fighting and a slow ad-<br />
vance. The terrain over which the attack<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made consisted of alternating draws<br />
and ridges, cleared ground and timber.<br />
Advance by ridge line or draw termi-<br />
nated in cross corridors, natural glacis<br />
for the enemy riflemen firing down the<br />
slope. At one point Company L suddenly<br />
w<strong>as</strong> swept by rifle and machine gun fire,<br />
suffered thirty c<strong>as</strong>ualties, lost two com-<br />
pany commanders in the space of min-<br />
utes, and became disorganized and un-<br />
able to move. Lt. Col. Robert E.<br />
Connor, the battalion commander, got<br />
the division artillery to work on the<br />
ridge line confronting the company, sent
498 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
his S–3, Capt. Frederic C. Thompson, up<br />
to sort out the demoralized soldiers and<br />
replace the platoon and squad leaders<br />
who were hors de combat, then put his<br />
reserve, Company K, in to flank the<br />
German position. The reserve company<br />
made its way to the head of a draw from<br />
which the enemy could be taken in en-<br />
filade. While this flanking fire swept<br />
the German line, Company L (reorgan-<br />
ized in two platoons of twenty-five men<br />
each) attacked with marching fire. The<br />
ridge w<strong>as</strong> gained and most of the de-<br />
fenders killed, but this time the attackers<br />
lost only three men. Company I, advanc-<br />
ing along a draw on which Werfers were<br />
directed, took many losses during the<br />
day. All told the 2d Infantry had made<br />
only a few hundred yards gain by the<br />
close of 24 December.<br />
The 3d Battalion commander re-<br />
ported that the action had been like try-<br />
ing to catch a rat in a maze. The Ger-<br />
SCHEIDGEN<br />
mans, familiar with the ground, had<br />
run back and forth through the draws,<br />
popping up in new and unexpected posi-<br />
tions. The Americans had lost direction<br />
and found maneuver difficult in the<br />
dense woods and jagged terrain, while<br />
their advance along the more direct<br />
paths offered by the draws had given<br />
the German batteries e<strong>as</strong>y targets. After<br />
the untoward events of this first day the<br />
regimental commander instructed his<br />
battalions to avoid the draws <strong>as</strong> much <strong>as</strong><br />
possible and work along the higher<br />
ground by short flanking attacks in which<br />
control could be retained.<br />
The 11 th Infantry took its attack po-<br />
sitions during the night of the 23d in the<br />
rear of the 10th Armored screen, the<br />
3d Battalion on the left at Larochette<br />
(Fels) and the 1st Battalion southe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Christnach. Colonel Black had been<br />
ordered to put his main effort on the<br />
right in an attack up the draws in sup-
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 499<br />
port of the 2d but decided to throw his<br />
weight on the left. The left battalion,<br />
draped in white sheets and supported<br />
by tanks, made its advance in column<br />
of companies on a narrow thrust line<br />
bearing north in the direction of Haller<br />
and hit squarely between the battalions<br />
of the 988th Regiment. Whenever the<br />
enemy stood his ground, artillery<br />
and tank fire w<strong>as</strong> brought to bear,<br />
quickly followed by infantry <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
paced with machine gun fire. Following<br />
a level ridge line the 3d Battalion made<br />
good time. By midafternoon it held its<br />
objective, a wooded rise less than a<br />
thousand yards southwest of Haller.<br />
The 1st Battalion had <strong>as</strong> its objective<br />
the wooded table which arose above the<br />
Schwarz Erntz northe<strong>as</strong>t of Christnach-<br />
the scene of bitter fighting and bloody<br />
losses for the Americans when the en-<br />
emy had held the initiative. Company<br />
A, sent down into the Müllerthal gorge<br />
while the remainder of the battalion<br />
threw in a holding attack on the left,<br />
moved slowly but steadily, until after<br />
some three hours it w<strong>as</strong> opposite the vil-<br />
lage of Mullerthal. Here the Germans<br />
had dug in, checking the advance with<br />
machine gun and mortar fire into the<br />
gorge from Waldbillig. Company B<br />
came in to help against Waldbillig,<br />
moving northwest through one of the<br />
cross corridors. As soon <strong>as</strong> the troops<br />
left the cover of the draw they encoun-<br />
tered direct fire, and it looked <strong>as</strong> though<br />
the 1st Battalion would find it tough to<br />
continue a frontal attack.<br />
The rapid advance by the 3d Battal-<br />
ion on the left appeared a solution to<br />
this tactical problem. Colonel Black pre-<br />
pared to alter the 11th Infantry scheme<br />
of maneuver on the 25th. The 3d Bat-<br />
talion w<strong>as</strong> to be relieved by the repi-<br />
mental reserve, then wheel to the right,<br />
byp<strong>as</strong>s south of Haller, and seize the<br />
two hill objectives, the Hardthof and<br />
Hohwald, in front of the 1st Battalion.<br />
During the night 1st Battalion patrols<br />
worked to the edge of Waldbillig, found<br />
little indication of enemy strength and<br />
by daylight the battalion had a company<br />
in the village.<br />
This first day of the 5th Division at-<br />
tack had netted rather limited gains ex-<br />
cept on the extreme left flank and in the<br />
10th Infantry sector at Hill 313. The<br />
six American battalions engaged had<br />
lost about two hundred dead and wound-<br />
ed. The enemy generally had held the<br />
attackers at arm’s length (only nineteen<br />
prisoners went through the 5th Division<br />
cage) and probably had fewer c<strong>as</strong>ual-<br />
ties. The German artillery had been very<br />
active and effective, despite heavy coun-<br />
terbattery fire, while the tortuous na-<br />
ture of the ground had robbed the gun-<br />
ners supporting the 5th Division of much<br />
good shooting. But something had been<br />
accomplished. The 4th Infantry Divi-<br />
sion at l<strong>as</strong>t had been relieved (although<br />
it proved difficult to find and make phys-<br />
ical contact with some isolated outposts<br />
of the 4th Division line), and Col.<br />
Charles H. Reed’s 2d Cavalry Group took<br />
over the quiet portion of the line on the<br />
right of the 5th Division.<br />
At the close of day, t<strong>here</strong> were indica-<br />
tions at several points that the enemy<br />
w<strong>as</strong> pulling away. A German withdraw-<br />
al actually did take place during the<br />
night. The 2d Infantry battle along the<br />
floor and sides of the Schwarz Erntz,<br />
viewed so pessimistically by those en-<br />
gaged, had convinced General Sensfuss,<br />
the 212th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
commander, that his extended right<br />
flank soon would be pierced or turned.
500 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
WHITE-CLAD 11TH INFANTRY TROOPS ATTACK TOWAD HALLER<br />
<strong>To</strong> form a shorter and thicker line, Sens-<br />
fuss drew in both flanks and gave up<br />
ground at his center, creating a new posi-<br />
tion which reached from Berdorf<br />
across the hills flanking the entrance to<br />
Echternach (only 2,500 yards from the<br />
center of that town) and west to the<br />
Sauer. Meanwhile the miscellaneous<br />
troops covering the flank of the 212th<br />
west of the river withdrew behind the<br />
Sauer, leaving only small outposts be-<br />
hind.<br />
The 10th Armored Division, to which<br />
were attached the 109th Infantry and<br />
CCA, 9th Armored, put two t<strong>as</strong>k forces<br />
into the attack on 24 December, their<br />
mission to clear the enemy from the<br />
Ermsdorf-Gilsdorf road. In keeping<br />
with the 5th Division attack on the right,<br />
the axis of advance generally ran north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. T<strong>as</strong>k Force Standish, on the right,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> weighted with tanks and armored<br />
infantry backed by two armored field<br />
artillery battalions. One of its two teams<br />
advanced with little opposition, ending<br />
the day just northwest of Eppeldorf. The<br />
second team came under the German<br />
guns while moving across open ground<br />
west of Eppeldorf; the first reports said<br />
half the team w<strong>as</strong> lost to shellfire and<br />
rockets. Driven back to the cover of a<br />
wood lot the team reorganized, took on<br />
reinforcements, and returned to the at-<br />
tack, this time swinging wide of the<br />
town to join the companion team. Later<br />
a t<strong>as</strong>k force from CCX (<strong>as</strong> CCA, 9th
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 501<br />
Armored Division, now w<strong>as</strong> named)<br />
seized the high ground west of Eppel-<br />
dorf.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Rudder, composed of two<br />
battalions (less than half strength) of<br />
the 109th Infantry, most of the 90th<br />
Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron, and<br />
a company of tank destroyers, found the<br />
Germans decamping from the narrow<br />
strip they had held south of the Sure<br />
River. Most of the fighting involved en-<br />
emy on the north bank from Ettelbruck<br />
to the e<strong>as</strong>t. The tank destroyers claimed<br />
to have caught and destroyed numerous<br />
vehicles and one horse-drawn battery.<br />
In Gilsdorf the German rear guard suc-<br />
ceeded in gaining a little time, but<br />
the attack continued e<strong>as</strong>tward until<br />
nightfall, when Rudder’s troops paused<br />
on the hill west of Moestroff.<br />
While this advance w<strong>as</strong> sweeping the<br />
near bank of the Sure the enemy de-<br />
stroyed his foot and ponton bridges. The<br />
10th Armored attack and the deep thrust<br />
achieved by the left wing of the 5th Di-<br />
vision in the Haller sector w<strong>as</strong> rapidly<br />
crowding the 276th Volks Grenadier Di-<br />
vision back on Wallendorf and Dillin-<br />
gen, the crossings over which the divi-<br />
sion had come on 16 December. On<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve Colonel Dempwolff<br />
moved the command posts of his divi-<br />
sion and regiments closer to the river–a<br />
sign of things to come. By this time t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> no real tactical connection between<br />
the 276th and the 212th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Divisions; each had been com-<br />
pressed into the area of its original<br />
bridgehead.<br />
Since the river line in the 10th Ar-<br />
mored Division zone had been reached<br />
on the first day of the XII Corps’ at-<br />
tack, Christm<strong>as</strong> p<strong>as</strong>sed quietly on the<br />
Ettelbruck - Moestroff - Eppeldorf line<br />
except for sounds of the tank destroy-<br />
ers sporadically bl<strong>as</strong>ting at German<br />
traffic across the Sure on the Diekirch-<br />
Bettendorf road. But for the 5th Infan-<br />
try Division Christm<strong>as</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no day of cel-<br />
ebration. At 0730 the infantry crawled<br />
out of their frozen foxholes and moved<br />
into the attack. During the first hours<br />
they encountered few of the enemy, for<br />
the 212th had given up considerable<br />
ground during the night withdrawal, but<br />
the German <strong>as</strong>sault guns and artillery<br />
quickly made their presence known. Al-<br />
though the 10th Infantry right slammed<br />
against the new enemy line in the Hardt<br />
woods before the day w<strong>as</strong> through,<br />
it succeeded in lining up with the 22d<br />
Infantry to the e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
The 3d Battalion, which had taken<br />
over Hill 313 during the night, found<br />
that the Germans had fallen back a few<br />
hundred yards to the far side of a fine<br />
natural barrier, the Leimerdelt draw.<br />
This ravine w<strong>as</strong> some two hundred feet<br />
deep and five hundred yards across; its<br />
sides were virtually cliffs. Attempts to<br />
work around the draw by way of trib-<br />
utary cross corridors failed because the<br />
enemy had blocked these routes with<br />
machine guns. Lt. Col. Alden Shipley,<br />
the battalion commander, <strong>as</strong>ked permis-<br />
sion to sideslip westward and flank the<br />
draw from higher ground, but the 2d<br />
Infantry w<strong>as</strong> engaged in the area Ship-<br />
ley needed for this maneuver and the<br />
request had to be denied.<br />
North of Scheidgen, on the 3d Bat-<br />
talion, 2d Infantry, front, American ar-<br />
tillery had pounded the enemy all<br />
through the night in preparation for the<br />
attack, some batteries using the new<br />
POZIT fuze. Soon after the infantry<br />
started forward, reports came back that<br />
much damage had been done the enemy,
502 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
that his line w<strong>as</strong> softening. By afternoon<br />
the battalion had advanced well into the<br />
Friemholz woods, but not until the tank-<br />
ers had shelled the enemy out of a fox-<br />
hole line at the timber’s edge. The 2d<br />
Battalion, after a rugged night for its<br />
main force in the Mullerthal gorge, set<br />
about extricating the two companies<br />
t<strong>here</strong> in preparation for the attack<br />
against Doster Farm. This w<strong>as</strong> no e<strong>as</strong>y<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k. Rather than work its way the length<br />
of one of the exit draws in which<br />
Company G had settled during the<br />
night, this company attacked up and<br />
over the bank, firing and taking its losses.<br />
Company F had a hard time disengag-<br />
ing, but got out along the path taken<br />
by Company G.<br />
MULLERTHAL<br />
The battalion finally re-formed on<br />
Company E, and the three serviceable<br />
tanks left in the attached platoon then<br />
prepared to attack Doster Farm, a small<br />
collection of stone buildings on an open<br />
rise. The German infantry had en-<br />
trenched <strong>here</strong>, while in the woods<br />
to the north a section of antitank<br />
guns covered the clearing. One of<br />
the enemy guns knocked out a tank but<br />
in so doing enabled American ob-<br />
servers to direct accurate fire on<br />
the gun positions. Once the guns<br />
were stilled the tanks and infantry took<br />
the farm by <strong>as</strong>sault, then pushed to with-<br />
in a thousand yards of Berdorf.<br />
West of the Mullerthal the 11th In-<br />
fantry set out on the wheeling move-
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 503<br />
ment planned the night before to re-<br />
duce the stubborn resistance in front of<br />
its right flank. Company A of the gist<br />
Chemical Battalion smoked Haller<br />
while the 3d Battalion, reinforced by ten<br />
Jumbo tanks from the 737th Tank Bat-<br />
talion, crossed the southern face of the<br />
village and attacked toward the Hardt-<br />
hof rise. After this rapid and success-<br />
ful advance, the tanks withdrew to help<br />
the 1st Battalion drive the enemy off<br />
the Hohwald northe<strong>as</strong>t of Waldbillig.<br />
Haller itself fell to the reserve battalion,<br />
which at twilight sent a rifle company<br />
and tank platoon against the village.<br />
Nearly two hundred prisoners were<br />
rounded up from the 988th, the center<br />
regiment of the 276th Yolks Grenadier<br />
Division.<br />
The 5th Division rate of advance had<br />
accelerated appreciably during the sec-<br />
ond day of action, particularly at those<br />
points w<strong>here</strong> tanks were brought into<br />
action. Difficult terrain, however, denied<br />
rapid exploitation and a clear break-<br />
chrough to the Sauer. Then, too, trench<br />
foot showed an alarming incidence<br />
among the attacking infantry, who<br />
found it impossible to keep their feet<br />
dry in this attack across the snow-fed<br />
streams in the bottom of the draws. The<br />
5th Division, like other veteran divi-<br />
sions, w<strong>as</strong> filled with troops who had<br />
returned to duty after evacuation for<br />
wounds or sickness, and these “RTD’s”<br />
were much more susceptible to trench<br />
foot than other troops. Still, it w<strong>as</strong> obvi-<br />
ous that the enemy w<strong>as</strong> in bad shape and<br />
lacked the rifle strength or the heavy<br />
weapons to stand for long against tank-<br />
infantry <strong>as</strong>sault. General Eddy and Gen-<br />
eral Irwin agreed that the attack w<strong>as</strong><br />
profitable and should continue, al-<br />
though both were anxious to get their<br />
troops under cover.<br />
The LXXX Corps could hardly be<br />
said to have a line of defense in either of<br />
its division bridgeheads on the 26th.<br />
Rather t<strong>here</strong> remained an unevenly<br />
linked chain of small troop concentra-<br />
tions defending wood lots, hills, or<br />
villages–in effect a series of bridgeheads<br />
within the two main bridgehead are<strong>as</strong>.<br />
The 212th Volks Grenadier Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
in a particularly hazardous position,<br />
for the attack by the 3d Battalion in the<br />
2d Infantry sector had carried to within<br />
sight of the Sauer, thus separating the<br />
German centers of defense at Berdorf<br />
and Echternach. In fact the enemy in-<br />
fantry to the front of the 3d Battalion<br />
had been forced to swim the chilly river<br />
on the night of the 25th.<br />
The 1st Battalion, 10th Infantry,<br />
emerged from the Hardt woods and ad-<br />
vanced <strong>as</strong>tride the ridge lines leading<br />
north to Echternach. German Teller<br />
mines linked with trip wires dotted the<br />
trails and the ridge crests, slowing the<br />
advance, but by dark the battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
only a half-mile from the town. The 3d<br />
Battalion, stopped the previous day at<br />
the Leimerdelt draw, renewed its ad-<br />
vance about 0300 with a stealthy de-<br />
scent into the draw, Company L mov-<br />
ing on the right to the bend w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
draw turned north toward Echternach.<br />
Company I, on the left, attacked at day-<br />
break through two tributary draws lead-<br />
ing out to the north, each rifleman<br />
weighed down with three bandoleers<br />
of ammunition. Attacking boldly, fir-<br />
ing at every possible enemy hiding place,<br />
and never halting for cover, the company<br />
killed the Germans in their foxholes or<br />
drove them back in flight toward the<br />
river. A small detachment of the enemy<br />
made a brief stand at Melick Farm,
504 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
then gave way to artillery shelling and<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault by Company L. Company I drove<br />
on to the ridge overlooking Echternach<br />
and the Sauer, while tanks shelled the<br />
woods and draw on the flank.<br />
From this vantage point the artillery<br />
observer accompanying the riflemen<br />
could see little groups of the enemy pad-<br />
dling across the river in rubber boats.<br />
A few were swimming, others were run-<br />
ning across a small wooden bridge. Time<br />
after time the forward artillery observer<br />
called for battalion concentrations,<br />
watching the bursts with the POZIT<br />
fuze thirty feet over the heads of the<br />
fleeing Germans and the murderous ef-<br />
fects t<strong>here</strong>from. For a while the enemy<br />
persisted in using the crossing site, then<br />
broke, fleeing into Echternach or along<br />
the road to Berdorf. That night patrols<br />
entered Echternach but could find no<br />
signs of the enemy or of Company E,<br />
12th Infantry, which, it w<strong>as</strong> hoped,<br />
still would be holed up somew<strong>here</strong> in<br />
the town.<br />
In the 5th Division center the 2d In-<br />
fantry struck at Berdorf and the hill<br />
m<strong>as</strong>s next to the Sauer, two companies<br />
of the 2d Battalion closing on Berdorf<br />
at dawn. T<strong>here</strong> in the half-light Com-<br />
pany G, marching on the left, saw troops<br />
standing in formation along the main<br />
village street while an officer pointed to<br />
various houses, apparently disposing his<br />
men. The American commander thought<br />
that Company E might have come in<br />
from the right, but when he called out,<br />
“Is that E<strong>as</strong>y Company?” a gruff voice<br />
answered “Yah, d<strong>as</strong> ist E<strong>as</strong>y Company.”<br />
The surprised Americans recovered in<br />
time to shoot down or capture a num-<br />
ber of the enemy, but enough reached<br />
the houses to organize a stubborn de-<br />
fense. Nevertheless by dark the 2d Bat-<br />
talion had captured half the town, a few<br />
prisoners, a number of decorated Christ-<br />
m<strong>as</strong> trees, and the cold leftovers of<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> dinner.<br />
Early in the fight Colonel Roffe de-<br />
cided to employ his reserve, the 1st Bat-<br />
talion, in a drive for the final regimental<br />
objective, the woods near Hamm Farm<br />
on the ridge north of Berdorf. The re-<br />
serve battalion marched in column to-<br />
ward Berdorf, expecting to p<strong>as</strong>s through<br />
the 2d Battalion, but found a bitter<br />
fight in progress and the surrounding<br />
area pl<strong>as</strong>tered with shellfire. When the<br />
1st Battalion tried to sideslip to the west<br />
it ran into a group of Germans in the<br />
draw on its left flank and very heavy<br />
artillery fire. Company C alone lost<br />
thirty-two men while deploying to<br />
attack. Not until the morning of 27 De-<br />
cember did the final collapse of the Ber-<br />
dorf defense enable the 1st Battalion<br />
to reach the woods at Hamm Farm. The<br />
3d Battalion had meanwhile come for-<br />
ward to the e<strong>as</strong>t of Berdorf and reached<br />
Birkelt Farm, overlooking the river.<br />
All that remained were small rear guard<br />
detachments, but these put up a real<br />
fight in the woods and stone farmhouses.<br />
That night many Germans withdrew<br />
and swam the river to reach the West<br />
Wall lines.<br />
The operations of the 11th Infantry<br />
on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day had forced consider-<br />
able retraction in the southern flank of<br />
the 276th Volks Grenadier Division.<br />
Colonel Black ordered the attack con-<br />
tinued on the 26th, sending two bat-<br />
talions against what w<strong>as</strong> left of the<br />
987th and 988th Regiments. Before<br />
daybreak the 2d Battalion wheeled<br />
right and began an attack along<br />
the road running from Haller to<br />
Beaufort. The leading company en-
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER<br />
countered the first of the enemy<br />
in the wooded ravine of the Hallerbach,<br />
well camouflaged in unorthodox posi-<br />
tions facing both sides of the ravine so<br />
that the attackers found themselves re-<br />
ceiving mortar, Werfer, and bullet fire<br />
from front and rear.<br />
About 1000 Maj. John N. Acuff, the<br />
battalion commander, withdrew his in-<br />
fantry a short distance to see what a mor-<br />
tar barrage could do. The woods were<br />
thick, visibility w<strong>as</strong> poor, and mortar<br />
fire proved not very effective. When the<br />
Americans resumed the <strong>as</strong>sault they in<br />
turn were hit by a counterattack. It w<strong>as</strong><br />
dusk when the enemy finally gave way<br />
and the 2d Battalion reached the woods<br />
north of the ravine. Ordered by Colonel<br />
Black to continue the attack through the<br />
night, the battalion converged shortly<br />
after midnight in a pincers move on<br />
BERDORF<br />
505<br />
the town of Beaufort, located on com-<br />
manding ground and controlling one of<br />
the main exit roads leading to the Dillin-<br />
gen bridge. The enemy held for awhile<br />
in the north edge of Beaufort but<br />
by daybreak had abandoned the town<br />
to the 2d Battalion.<br />
During the morning of 26 December<br />
the 3d Battalion had attacked almost<br />
without opposition, crossing the Haller-<br />
bach ravine and gaining the high ground<br />
to the e<strong>as</strong>t of Beaufort and overlooking<br />
the road to Dillingen. But when the<br />
first appetizing target appeared, a col-<br />
umn of a hundred or more vehicles<br />
heading for the Dillingen bridge, the<br />
artillery radios failed to function and<br />
a h<strong>as</strong>ty barrage laid on the road by mor-<br />
tars and machine guns caught only the<br />
tail of the column. By noon patrols were<br />
in position on the river bank to observe
506 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the Dillingen bridge site. Calls for ar-<br />
tillery fire this time got through to the<br />
batteries, but the gunners had difficulty<br />
in directing fire into the deep river Val-<br />
ley. The division air support party vec-<br />
tored a flight of P–47’s over the bridge,<br />
but three separate p<strong>as</strong>ses failed to gain<br />
a hit. Later in the day the artillery ob-<br />
servers succeeded in getting high-angle<br />
fire on the bridge; one hit registered<br />
while the span w<strong>as</strong> crowded with men<br />
and vehicles, but the bridge continued<br />
in use.<br />
At the end of this third day of the<br />
5th Division attack General Eddy and<br />
General Irwin agreed that the mission<br />
<strong>as</strong>signed w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong> good <strong>as</strong> accomplished.<br />
The west bank of the Sauer had been<br />
gained at several points, and the enemy<br />
w<strong>as</strong> h<strong>as</strong>tening to recross the river and<br />
gain the protection of the West Wall.<br />
The Americans had taken over five hun-<br />
dred prisoners in the period of 24–26<br />
December and had recovered much<br />
American materiel, lost in the first days<br />
of the German advance. T<strong>here</strong> still re-<br />
mained some necessary mopping up in<br />
those pockets w<strong>here</strong> the German rear<br />
guard held on to cover the withdrawal<br />
of the l<strong>as</strong>t units of the LXXX Corps <strong>as</strong><br />
these made their way to safety.<br />
Although the 212th completed its<br />
withdrawal over the Bollendorf bridge<br />
during the night of 26 December, rov-<br />
ing patrols continued to operate on the<br />
American side of the river well into<br />
January. The 276th Yolks Grenadier<br />
Division held in some force for another<br />
twenty-four hours under specific Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> orders to do so in keeping<br />
with the larger army mission of<br />
containment. For the 11th Infantry,<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> one l<strong>as</strong>t round of<br />
fighting, fighting which cost the 1st Bat-<br />
talion dear in attacks against Bigelbach<br />
on the 27th. German artillery and<br />
Werfers, emplaced on the e<strong>as</strong>t bank of<br />
the river, made good practice, while the<br />
worn grenadiers fought stubbornly<br />
w<strong>here</strong>ver they were <strong>as</strong>sailed.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> one exit through which<br />
the German rear guard could hope to<br />
escape with minimum loss of men and<br />
equipment once its delaying stint w<strong>as</strong><br />
completed-the Dillingen bridge, built<br />
by the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> engineers for just<br />
this purpose. American fighter-bombers<br />
made a second effort against the span on<br />
27 December, but reported near mis-<br />
ses. Colonel Dempwolff h<strong>as</strong> said that he<br />
w<strong>as</strong> much worried about the bridge dur-<br />
ing the daylight hours of the 27th. Dra-<br />
matically, the real danger to the division<br />
came after dark just <strong>as</strong> the final with-<br />
drawal commenced. Perhaps the law of<br />
averages w<strong>as</strong> working, or it may be that<br />
an American gunner put some partic-<br />
ularly potent spell on this one shell;<br />
in any c<strong>as</strong>e, a direct hit bl<strong>as</strong>ted a gap<br />
of about fifteen yards in the bridge<br />
structure. When the German engineers<br />
h<strong>as</strong>tened to repair the span, they came<br />
under small arms fire from American pa-<br />
trols working down toward the river.<br />
Then, about 0200, shellfire suddenly in-<br />
cre<strong>as</strong>ed to feverish intensity and the en-<br />
gineers were driven off the bridge. This<br />
shelling finally slackened, the span w<strong>as</strong><br />
repaired, the <strong>as</strong>sault guns, flak, and ve-<br />
hicles filed across, and just after day-<br />
break the Germans blew the bridge.<br />
From 22 December, when the 10th In-<br />
fantry launched the 5th Division attack<br />
toward the Sauer, until 28 December,<br />
when the l<strong>as</strong>t formal resistance ended,<br />
the division took over 800 prisoners. Es-<br />
timates by burial parties set the num-<br />
ber of Germans killed at about the same
THE XII CORPS ATTACKS THE SOUTHERN SHOULDER 507<br />
figure. Losses in the 5th Division totaled<br />
46 officers and 899 men <strong>as</strong> battle c<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ualties; 22 officers and 598 men were<br />
nonbattle c<strong>as</strong>ualties–a high ratio but<br />
understandable in terms of the contin-<br />
ued 20º cold and the footslogging ad-<br />
vance through countless icy streams.<br />
The 276th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
lost about 2,000 officers and men be-<br />
tween 20 and 28 December, from all<br />
causes, and the original division com-<br />
mander had been killed in the action.<br />
Many of its companies were reduced to<br />
ten-man strength. The average strength<br />
of the rifle companies in the 212th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, when they returned<br />
to the West Wall, w<strong>as</strong> 25–30 men,<br />
but the figure is derived from losses suf-<br />
fered since 16 December. Although this<br />
division w<strong>as</strong> better trained than the<br />
276th, it generally had engaged in<br />
harder fighting. Its total losses, <strong>as</strong> esti-<br />
mated by the division commander, were<br />
about 4,000 officers and men. The only<br />
exact c<strong>as</strong>ualty report extant is that of<br />
the 988th Regiment, which on 15 De-<br />
cember had been at its full strength of<br />
1,868 officers and men. By 28 December<br />
the regiment had suffered losses <strong>as</strong> fol-<br />
lows: 190 known killed, 561 missing in<br />
action, 411 hospitalized <strong>as</strong> sick or<br />
wounded.<br />
The terrain on which the 4th Infan-<br />
try Division had defended and over<br />
which the 5th Infantry Division had<br />
attacked proved to bees difficult <strong>as</strong> any<br />
on which military operations were con-<br />
ducted in the course of the Ardennes<br />
campaign. For this re<strong>as</strong>on the battle at<br />
the south shoulder of the Bulge merits<br />
perusal by the student of tactics. Amer-<br />
ican superiority in heavy supporting<br />
weapons, tanks, and tank destroyers<br />
never had the full tactical effectiveness<br />
on this broken ground which normally<br />
would be the c<strong>as</strong>e. The military stu-<br />
dent, however, will have noticed that<br />
the psychological effect of American<br />
tanks and tank destroyers on an enemy<br />
who had no tanks and very few anti-<br />
tank guns w<strong>as</strong> considerable. For this bat-<br />
tle German commanders all make much<br />
of those periods during the initial Amer-<br />
ican defense and the ultimate coun-<br />
terattack when tanks, even in platoon<br />
strength, were employed against them.<br />
The relative immobility of the two Ger-<br />
man divisions, whose flexibility in at-<br />
tack and defense depended almost<br />
entirely on the leg power of tired in-<br />
fantry, gave both General Barton and<br />
General Irwin a considerable advan-<br />
tage in timing, whether it w<strong>as</strong> in mov-<br />
ing troops to counter a thrust or in ex-<br />
ploiting weaknesses in the enemy line.<br />
The use of artillery on both sides of<br />
the line is one of the features of the<br />
XII Corps operations at the Sauer, and<br />
in numerous actions German use of the<br />
rocket launcher proved particularly<br />
disquieting to the Americans. This<br />
weapon, whose total weight w<strong>as</strong> only<br />
some 1,200 pounds, but which could dis-<br />
charge 450 pounds of high explosive in<br />
ten seconds, more than made up for the<br />
limited number of conventional artil-<br />
lery tubes that the LXXX Corps had in<br />
the bridgehead, and its e<strong>as</strong>e of move-<br />
ment and small silhouette were admir-<br />
ably suited to the broken ground west<br />
of the Sauer. The rate and weight of<br />
rocket projector fire, plus the fact that<br />
the limited German artillery could con-<br />
centrate to cover well-defined and de-<br />
limited paths of advance, led the veter-<br />
an 5th Division to claim that it had been<br />
more heavily shelled during these days<br />
than in any battle it had sustained.
508 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
The artillery support furnished the 5th<br />
Division, however, had been very effec-<br />
tive; German records note it with con-<br />
siderable dist<strong>as</strong>te. As might be expected<br />
of this pockmarked and tortuous ground,<br />
both sides speak with respect of the<br />
enemy’s mortars.<br />
By 26 December, the l<strong>as</strong>t day of full-<br />
fledged attack by the XII Corps against<br />
the Sauer salient, the Third <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
fully oriented on its new axis. With the<br />
6th Armored Division en route from<br />
the south to join the XII Corps, it w<strong>as</strong><br />
possible to relieve the armor already in<br />
the zone and effect a general regrouping<br />
calculated to restore some organizational<br />
unity. CCA, 9th Armored, t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
fore, w<strong>as</strong> ordered to Arlon and<br />
III Corps control; the 109th Infantry<br />
w<strong>as</strong> restored to the 28th Infantry<br />
Division, still with the VIII Corps;<br />
the 10th Armored Division w<strong>as</strong> directed<br />
to hand over its sector to the 6th Ar-<br />
mored Division on 27 December and<br />
rejoin the XX Corps at Metz. General<br />
Patton, wishing to integrate his northern<br />
front a little better, redrafted the bound-<br />
ary between the III and XII Corps so<br />
that the 80th Infantry Division p<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
in place to the latter. This new inter-<br />
corps boundary would originate in the<br />
north near Wiltz, run south toward Hei-<br />
derscheid, and continue to a point be-<br />
low Merzig.<br />
Neither Patton nor Eddy had a defi-<br />
nite plan for the employment of the<br />
XII Corps once its immediate mission<br />
w<strong>as</strong> accomplished and the anchor posi-<br />
tion of the Third <strong>Army</strong> opposite the<br />
German shoulder w<strong>as</strong> secured. When it<br />
became apparent that the fight on the<br />
near bank of the Sauer w<strong>as</strong> nearly fin-<br />
ished, the corps commander made a ten-<br />
tative plan–probably at Patton’s instiga-<br />
tion-for an attack north over the Sure<br />
River and on toward Bitburg using his<br />
new armored division and the 10th In-<br />
fantry. In addition Eddy <strong>as</strong>ked Irwin’s<br />
opinion on a river crossing by the 5th<br />
Infantry Division. General Irwin agreed<br />
that such a follow-up w<strong>as</strong> “worth a<br />
thought,” re<strong>as</strong>oning that “the West Wall<br />
line in front is weak and we have de-<br />
stroyed much of the garrison.”<br />
The Third <strong>Army</strong> commander finally<br />
decided that the 5th and 80th Infantry<br />
Divisions would hold the existing line<br />
while the 6th Armored moved west to<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne sector and t<strong>here</strong> attacked<br />
northward on the left of the 4th Ar-<br />
mored Division. The corps front w<strong>as</strong><br />
duly re-formed, the 5th Division edging<br />
to the left to join the 80th and the 4th<br />
Infantry Division (now commanded by<br />
Brig. Gen. Harold W. Blakeley because<br />
General Barton had been evacuated<br />
by re<strong>as</strong>on of illness) taking over<br />
a wider sector on the right. The corps<br />
commander did not immediately dismiss<br />
the idea of an attack e<strong>as</strong>t across the Sauer<br />
River and through the West Wall. This<br />
project w<strong>as</strong> on-again-off-again until, on<br />
2 January, Patton ordered that plans be<br />
made for a corps attack northward. The<br />
XII Corps front, however, would re-<br />
main quiet until 18 January.
CHAPTER XXI<br />
The III Corps’ Counterattack<br />
The Verdun meeting on 19 December<br />
set in chain the first of a series of actions<br />
which the Allies would take to wrest the<br />
initiative from the enemy. Nonetheless a<br />
few momentous, nerve-shaking days had<br />
to elapse before the first gun of the<br />
counterattack could be fired. <strong>To</strong> gain<br />
time and save troops the Supreme Com-<br />
mander w<strong>as</strong> willing to let the Allied<br />
forces fall back <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> necessary–al-<br />
though it w<strong>as</strong> tacitly understood that the<br />
Meuse River must be the limit for any<br />
withdrawal. On the 20th General Strong,<br />
the SHAEF chief of intelligence, ad-<br />
vised General Eisenhower that it looked<br />
<strong>as</strong> if the German command had com-<br />
mitted everything it had to the offensive.<br />
Flying weather w<strong>as</strong> poor and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
a chance that the Allies now could re-<br />
group for a concerted counterattack both<br />
north and south without these troop<br />
movements being discovered from the<br />
air. On this date, t<strong>here</strong>fore, Eisenhower<br />
gave Bradley and Montgomery their<br />
orders for a counteroffensive against the<br />
German salient, to be undertaken <strong>as</strong> soon<br />
<strong>as</strong> possible.<br />
Air Chief Marshal Tedder, the Dep-<br />
uty Supreme Allied Commander, and a<br />
number of others on the SHAEF staff<br />
feared that the impetuous Patton would<br />
persuade Bradley to let him start the<br />
counterattack from the south with only<br />
<strong>To</strong>ward B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
a couple of divisions and that it then<br />
would develop piecemeal, <strong>as</strong> had the<br />
German counterattack in Normandy,<br />
without a solid tactical b<strong>as</strong>e or concrete<br />
result. The Supreme Commander himself<br />
w<strong>as</strong> well aware of the Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
commander’s penchant for cut and<br />
thrust tactics and probably needed little<br />
urging to take some action calculated to<br />
hold Patton within the constraints of<br />
“the big picture.” On the other hand<br />
Eisenhower recognized that the continued<br />
occupation of B<strong>as</strong>togne, the key<br />
to the entire road net on the south side<br />
of the German Bulge, w<strong>as</strong> essential to<br />
future offensive operations. Patton, <strong>as</strong><br />
the SHAEF staff saw it, would make the<br />
narrow thrust on the Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
axis, but any more ambitious plans<br />
would have to be subordinated to the<br />
larger strategy. 1 Eisenhower, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
told Bradley that the American counterattack<br />
via B<strong>as</strong>togne should be held in<br />
check and not allowed to spread, that it<br />
w<strong>as</strong>, after all, only a steppingstone for<br />
the “main counteroffensive.”<br />
Preparations for the Attack<br />
Possibly the “lucky” commander<br />
needed some curb. on his in<strong>here</strong>nt opti-<br />
1 The Robb Notes are the source of the Supreme<br />
Commander’s views.
510 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
mism, but regardless of any pose which<br />
Patton may have <strong>as</strong>sumed in the war<br />
council at Verdun he and his staff went<br />
about the business of mounting this first<br />
counterattack coolly and methodically. 2<br />
The direction of attack already had been<br />
set by General Eisenhower, that is,<br />
north from an <strong>as</strong>sembly area around<br />
Arlon. The immediate mission, <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
by the higher command after the Verdun<br />
meeting, w<strong>as</strong> the “relief” of B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
and the use of its road net <strong>as</strong> a sally port<br />
for a drive by the Third <strong>Army</strong> to St.<br />
Vith in the larger Allied offensive. D-<br />
day for the counterattack w<strong>as</strong> 22 Decem-<br />
ber. It must be added that the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> order issued the day before the<br />
attack w<strong>as</strong> rather ambitious, containing<br />
a typical Patton flourish in the prescrip-<br />
tion of an eventual wheel to the north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t and seizure of the Rhine crossings<br />
“in zone.” The forces to be employed<br />
had been earmarked <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> the night<br />
of 18 December when Bradley and Pat-<br />
ton agreed to move the new III Corps<br />
headquarters (<strong>as</strong> yet inexperienced and<br />
untried) from Metz to Arlon. The divi-<br />
sions given Maj. Gen. John Millikin (the<br />
26th Infantry Division, 80th Infantry Di-<br />
vision, and 4th Armored Division) all<br />
had been out of the line or in a quiet<br />
sector when the Third <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> or-<br />
2 The operations of the Third <strong>Army</strong> in the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne counterattack are the subject of a special<br />
journal prepared by the T<strong>US</strong>A G–3 staff (in<br />
the author’s possession). In addition the T<strong>US</strong>A<br />
chief of staff, General Gay, kept an official Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> diary (referred to <strong>here</strong>after <strong>as</strong> Gay Diary),<br />
a copy of which w<strong>as</strong> used by the author. The<br />
personal data on General Patton is interesting<br />
but adds little to the official records. See also<br />
George S. Patton, Jr., War As I Knew It (Boston:<br />
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1947) and Harry<br />
H. Semmes, Portrait of Patton (New York: Apple-<br />
ton-Century-Crofts, Inc., 1955) .<br />
GENERAL MILLIKIN<br />
dered north, and thus were selected al-<br />
most automatically. 3<br />
The area chosen for the III Corps<br />
counterattack extended from the Alzette<br />
River on the e<strong>as</strong>t to Neufchateau in the<br />
west, a front of some thirty miles. Actu-<br />
ally these points were not on formal<br />
boundaries but rather represent the<br />
limits within which the III Corps opera-<br />
tion finally developed. This zone, the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern part lying in Luxembourg, the<br />
western in Belgium, contains some of the<br />
most rugged ground in the Ardennes.<br />
E<strong>as</strong>t of the Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne axis two<br />
deeply eroded corridors, cut by the Sure<br />
and Wiltz Rivers, form effective barriers<br />
to mechanized or motorized advance<br />
from the south. The entire area is criss-<br />
crossed with rivers and streams, but those<br />
of the tableland west of B<strong>as</strong>togne lack<br />
the gorgelike beds found to the e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
Here, <strong>as</strong> in other parts of the Ardennes,<br />
3 III Corps AAR; G–2 and G–3 Jnls.
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 511<br />
dense woods alternate with rolling fields<br />
and clearings. The land is veined with<br />
roads, but of varying quality; at their<br />
interlacings are found the single farm-<br />
house or the village of a half-dozen<br />
dwellings, all promising the phenome-<br />
non common to military operations in<br />
the Ardennes–the fight for the cross-<br />
road. B<strong>as</strong>togne, with seven entrant roads,<br />
naturally dominates the road complex in<br />
this area whether movement be from e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
to west, <strong>as</strong> attempted by the XLYII<br />
Panzer Corps, or from south to north, <strong>as</strong><br />
planned for the American III Corps. But<br />
in addition to the south-to-north highway<br />
from Arlon to B<strong>as</strong>togne, t<strong>here</strong> are main<br />
roads branching from Arlon to the north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t and northwest, thus offering some<br />
flexibility of maneuver. Only one main<br />
road south of B<strong>as</strong>togne runs e<strong>as</strong>t and<br />
west, that from Luxembourg City<br />
through Arlon to Neufchateau. This<br />
road would form the b<strong>as</strong>e of operations<br />
for the III Corps. (See Map IX.)<br />
The enemy situation on the new III<br />
Corps front w<strong>as</strong> obscure. The B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
garrison knew little of the German de-<br />
ployment beyond the encircling units in<br />
direct contact, while the VIII Corps’<br />
screen, behind which the III Corps w<strong>as</strong><br />
forming, had been too weak to fight for<br />
information. The situation along most of<br />
the tenuous and sketchy VIII Corps line<br />
w<strong>as</strong> indeed so confused that the location<br />
of friendly roadblocks or outposts could<br />
hardly be plotted. On the day before the<br />
counterattack it w<strong>as</strong> known that the<br />
German columns had carried to and be-<br />
yond B<strong>as</strong>togne. It w<strong>as</strong> presumed that the<br />
Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne road had been cut, but<br />
this w<strong>as</strong> not certain. Elements of four<br />
German divisions were supposed to be in<br />
the line opposite the III Corps: the 5th<br />
Parachute and the 212th, 276th, and<br />
352d Yolks Grenadier Divisions. All<br />
but the 5th Parachute had been identi-<br />
fied days earlier <strong>as</strong> belonging to the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong>. What these enemy divi-<br />
sions could do and what they intended<br />
to do quite literally w<strong>as</strong> any man’s guess.<br />
The III Corps attack would have to push<br />
off through a fragmentary screen of<br />
friendly troops whose positions were un-<br />
certain, against an enemy whose exact<br />
location w<strong>as</strong> unknown, over terrain<br />
which had not been scouted by the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
The enemy w<strong>as</strong> equally in the dark <strong>as</strong><br />
to the III Corps capabilities and inten-<br />
tions. The 26th Infantry Division could<br />
not be located by German intelligence<br />
after it left Metz and would not be iden-<br />
tified <strong>as</strong> present in its new sector until<br />
two days after the American drive com-<br />
menced. The enemy traced the 80th into<br />
Luxembourg, but on 22 December be-<br />
lieved it w<strong>as</strong> reinforcing “remnants” of<br />
the 4th Infantry Division in a purely de-<br />
fensive role.<br />
When General Millikin and his staff<br />
settled into the Arlon headquarters on<br />
20 December, with only two days to go<br />
before the counterattack target date, the<br />
divisions that made up the attack force<br />
were either still on the move or were<br />
barely completing their shift. The 26th<br />
Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong> en route from<br />
Metz to Arlon; the 80th Division had<br />
just closed into an <strong>as</strong>sembly area near<br />
Luxembourg City after a march of 150<br />
miles; the 4th Armored Division had<br />
reached Arlon and w<strong>as</strong> trying to find its<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembly area on the Arlon-Neufchateau<br />
road. Nor were the three divisions<br />
equally ready for return to the fray.<br />
The 26th Division (Maj. Gen. Willard<br />
S. Paul) w<strong>as</strong> full of rifle replacements,<br />
mostly inexperienced and lacking recent
512 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
infantry training. This division had seen<br />
its first combat in October and had lost<br />
almost 3,000 men during bitter fighting<br />
in Lorraine. Withdrawn in early Decem-<br />
ber to take over the Third <strong>Army</strong> “rein-<br />
forcement” training program at Metz,<br />
the 26th Division had just received 2,585<br />
men <strong>as</strong> replacements and, on 18 Decem-<br />
ber, w<strong>as</strong> beginning its program (sched-<br />
uled for thirty days) when the German<br />
counteroffensive canceled its role <strong>as</strong> a<br />
training division. The “trainees,” men<br />
taken from headquarters, antitank sec-<br />
tions, and the like, at once were pre-<br />
empted to fill the ranks left gaping by<br />
the Lorraine battles. Knowing only that<br />
an undefined combat mission lay ahead,<br />
the division rolled north to Arlon, com-<br />
pleting its move shortly before midnight<br />
of the 20th. Not until the next day did<br />
General Paul learn that his division w<strong>as</strong><br />
to attack on the early morning of the 22d.<br />
The 80th Division (General Mc-<br />
Bride) w<strong>as</strong> in good condition. As one of<br />
the units being primed by the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> for the forthcoming attack against<br />
the West Wall, the 80th had been<br />
granted priority on replacements, had<br />
been rested at St. Avold, and on 18<br />
December w<strong>as</strong> on its way into the line<br />
near Zweibrücken when General Patton<br />
ordered the move to Luxembourg.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> the 80th found itself under the<br />
control of the III Corps, its only orders<br />
to take up a reserve battle position in<br />
the 4th Infantry Division zone. On 21<br />
December McBride first learned that his<br />
division would attack the following<br />
morning.<br />
The 4th Armored Division (Maj. Gen.<br />
Hugh J. Gaffey) had come north under<br />
hurried and contradictory orders, the<br />
result of the usual time lag between a<br />
command decision reached in personal<br />
conferences by the top commanders and<br />
the receipt of this decision in the lower<br />
tactical units. CCB, for example, oper-<br />
ated for two days under VIII Corps<br />
while the rest of the division w<strong>as</strong> en<br />
route to III Corps-a fact that h<strong>as</strong> bear-<br />
ing on the subsequent story of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
On the night of 18 December General<br />
Bradley had told Patton, “I understand<br />
from General Ike you are to take over<br />
the VIII Corps.” That same night CCB,<br />
4th Armored, started for Longwy and the<br />
road to Luxembourg. The next day the<br />
rest of the division followed, under<br />
verbal orders from Patton attaching the<br />
4th Armored Division to the III Corps.<br />
These orders were countermanded, then<br />
reaffirmed by the 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group in<br />
the course of the 19th.<br />
The advance party of CCB arrived<br />
meanwhile at Arlon, and found that the<br />
VIII Corps w<strong>as</strong> the only corps operating<br />
in the area, the III Corps headquarters<br />
not yet having appeared on the scene.<br />
Brig. Gen. Holmes E. Dager reported to<br />
the commander of the VIII Corps,<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> officially under the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
and would be until noon on 20 Decem-<br />
ber, although all concerned knew that it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to p<strong>as</strong>s to the Third <strong>Army</strong>. General<br />
Middleton perforce had command of<br />
this Third <strong>Army</strong> unit before the antici-<br />
pated change, w<strong>here</strong><strong>as</strong> Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
records continued to show the entire 4th<br />
Armored Division <strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed to the III<br />
Corps. At Dager’s request the corps<br />
commander agreed to keep CCB to-<br />
gether <strong>as</strong> a tactical unit instead of<br />
parceling it out along the front.<br />
The 4th Armored Division had won a<br />
brilliant reputation during the autumn<br />
battles in Lorraine. It w<strong>as</strong> a favorite of<br />
the Third <strong>Army</strong> commander; so, when<br />
its leader, Maj. Gen. John S. Wood, w<strong>as</strong>
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 513<br />
returned to the United States for rest<br />
and recuperation, General Patton named<br />
his own chief of staff <strong>as</strong> Wood’s successor.<br />
On 10 December the 4th Armored Divi-<br />
sion came out of the line after five<br />
months of incessant fighting. The l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
ph<strong>as</strong>e of combat, the attack in the Saar<br />
mud, had been particularly trying and<br />
costly. Replacements, both men and<br />
matériel, were not to be had; trained<br />
tank crews could not be found in the<br />
conventional replacement centers–in<br />
fact these specialists no longer were<br />
trained in any number in the United<br />
States. When the division started for<br />
Luxembourg it w<strong>as</strong> short 713 men and<br />
19 officers in the tank and infantry bat-<br />
talions and the cavalry squadron.<br />
The state of materiel w<strong>as</strong> much<br />
poorer, for t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a shortage of<br />
medium tanks throughout the European<br />
theater. The division could replace only<br />
a few of its actual losses and w<strong>as</strong> short<br />
twenty-one Shermans when ordered<br />
north; worse, ordnance could not ex-<br />
change worn and battle-damaged tanks<br />
for new. Tanks issued in the United<br />
Kingdom in the spring of 1944 were still<br />
operating, many of them after several<br />
major repair jobs, and all with mileage<br />
records beyond named life expectancy.<br />
Some could be run only at medium<br />
speed. Others had turrets whose electri-<br />
cal traverse no longer functioned and<br />
had to be cranked around by hand.<br />
Tracks and motors were worn badly:<br />
the 8th Tank Battalion alone had thirty-<br />
three tanks drop out because of mechan-<br />
ical failure in the 160-mile rush to the<br />
Ardennes. But even with battle-weary<br />
tanks and a large admixture of green<br />
tankers and armored infantry the 4th<br />
Armored Division, on its record, could<br />
be counted an <strong>as</strong>set in any operation re-<br />
quiring initiative and battle know-how.<br />
The Ezell T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
It is obvious that the Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
could never have put troops into the<br />
Luxembourg area <strong>as</strong> quickly <strong>as</strong> it did<br />
without a wholesale scuttling of “paper<br />
work” and “channels”; that improvisa-<br />
tion and reliance on the field telephone<br />
<strong>as</strong> a medium for attaining clear under-<br />
standing have in<strong>here</strong>nt dangers is<br />
equally clear. A bizarre adventure that<br />
befell CCB of the 4th Armored in its<br />
peregrinations typifies the period of<br />
“piecemeal reaction,” <strong>as</strong> some of the<br />
participants style it, when Middleton’s<br />
VIII Corps w<strong>as</strong> trying to plug the yawn-<br />
ing gaps in its front with rifle platoons of<br />
engineers and mechanics, and before an<br />
American riposte could be made in force.<br />
Bradley had told the VIII Corps com-<br />
mander on the night of 18 December<br />
that reinforcements were coming up<br />
from the Third <strong>Army</strong>. Sometime later<br />
Middleton learned that the 4th Armored<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> heading northward, led by<br />
CCB and apparently under attachment<br />
to his dwindling command. Another<br />
tank command from the Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
(CCB, 10th Armored Division) had just<br />
arrived on the scene, but this Middleton<br />
had committed at once to shore up the<br />
crumbling defenses between B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
and Wiltz. At noon on the 19th (before<br />
the VIII Corps had p<strong>as</strong>sed to the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong>) General Middleton telephoned<br />
the First <strong>Army</strong> commander and <strong>as</strong>ked if<br />
he might use CCB of the 4th Armored<br />
on its arrival. Uncertain of the command<br />
situation Hodges referred the request to<br />
Bradley, who told the VIII Corps com-<br />
mander that he could employ CCB but<br />
only if necessary to hold his position.
514 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
By midnight CCB had ended its 150-<br />
mile ride and closed in villages on the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t side of Vaux-lez-Rosihres; all the<br />
journal sergeant could enter at this hour<br />
w<strong>as</strong> “mission unknown.” But by the<br />
morning of the 20th the status and duties<br />
of Dager’s command were really con-<br />
fused, for the III Corps had opened its<br />
command post at Arlon and proceeded<br />
to give orders on the <strong>as</strong>sumption that<br />
the 4th Armored Division in its entirety<br />
w<strong>as</strong> reporting to General Millikin. The<br />
VIII Corps had ordered Dager to send<br />
an officer to B<strong>as</strong>togne at daylight on the<br />
20th to determine the exact situation<br />
t<strong>here</strong>, but about 0500 that morning<br />
someone on the VIII Corps G–9 staff-<br />
who it w<strong>as</strong> cannot be determined–or-<br />
dered Dager to send a tank company, an<br />
armored infantry company, and a bat-<br />
tery of self-propelled artillery into<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Although Dager argued against this<br />
fragmentization of his force, at 1030 the<br />
small team w<strong>as</strong> on its way, led by Capt.<br />
Bert Ezell, executive officer of the 8th<br />
Tank Battalion, who earlier had been<br />
named the liaison officer to the 101st<br />
Airborne. The only mission specified w<strong>as</strong><br />
“to aid CCB of the 10th Armored Divi-<br />
sion.” Since CCB had bivouacked close<br />
to the Neufchâteau-B<strong>as</strong>togne road this<br />
route w<strong>as</strong> used. T<strong>here</strong> had been rumors<br />
that the Germans had cut the road, but<br />
nobody seemed to know for certain and<br />
American reconnaissance w<strong>as</strong> woefully<br />
lacking in this sector. En route the team<br />
received–or heard–a little small arms<br />
fire. In B<strong>as</strong>togne Ezell reported to the<br />
101st chief of staff, who turned him over<br />
to the division G–3, who p<strong>as</strong>sed him on<br />
to General McAuliffe, who <strong>as</strong>signed him<br />
to Colonel Roberts, commanding CCB<br />
of the 10th Armored. Roberts ordered<br />
Ezell to <strong>as</strong>semble his t<strong>as</strong>k force at<br />
Villeroux two and a half miles southwest<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne and gave him a number of<br />
missions.<br />
About 1400 a radio message from CCB<br />
rescinded Ezell’s original orders and told<br />
him to return to Nives, the 8th Tank<br />
Battalion bivouack. This is what had<br />
happened. Telephone connection be-<br />
tween CCB and General Gaffey’s 4th<br />
Armored command post had opened,<br />
giving Dager an opportunity to express<br />
his concern over the way in which his<br />
command w<strong>as</strong> being whittled away piece-<br />
meal. Gaffey immediately ordered Dager<br />
to recall the t<strong>as</strong>k force at B<strong>as</strong>togne and to<br />
move CCB into <strong>as</strong>sembly with the rest of<br />
the division northwest of Arlon.<br />
Figuring that someone higher in<br />
authority would inform Roberts or<br />
McAuliffe, Ezell and his team started for<br />
home. On the way into B<strong>as</strong>togne the t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force had noticed two battalions of field<br />
artillery beside the road, the pieces and<br />
prime movers jammed together, equip-<br />
ment scattered, and most of the gunners<br />
fleeing along the road to the south. This<br />
time the t<strong>as</strong>k force stopped, found one<br />
dead man lying by his prime mover, shot<br />
in the head, and an artillery captain<br />
singlehandedly trying to hitch up the<br />
guns and move them to the road. Lieu-<br />
tenant Kiley, who commanded the tank<br />
company, hitched three of the pieces to<br />
his tanks and left a few of his men to<br />
help the anonymous captain. Seven hours<br />
after the team set out it w<strong>as</strong> back with<br />
CCB. Ezell had counted only three ar-<br />
tillery rounds during the trip and had<br />
seen signal men calmly laying wire along<br />
the highway. At dusk on the 20th, then,<br />
the Neufchâteau-B<strong>as</strong>togne road still w<strong>as</strong><br />
in friendly hands. Why w<strong>as</strong> CCB <strong>as</strong> a<br />
unit not put in to hold this corridor
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 515<br />
open? T<strong>here</strong> is no certain answer. The<br />
episode of Ezell’s t<strong>as</strong>k force can be read<br />
only through the fog of war <strong>as</strong> this<br />
is generated by the failure of communi-<br />
cations, the complexity and unwieldi-<br />
ness of field command, and the natural,<br />
human proclivity for overrating (or<br />
underrating) the accomplishments of<br />
the enemy. 4<br />
“Drive Like Hell”<br />
General Patton inspected the III<br />
Corps dispositions and divisions on 20<br />
December, concluded that the corps con-<br />
centration w<strong>as</strong> proceeding satisfactorily,<br />
and the following day gave the order<br />
for attack at 0600 on the 22d. The corps<br />
scheme of maneuver, issued to the divi-<br />
sions in the early afternoon, w<strong>as</strong> simple.<br />
The III Corps would advance north in<br />
the direction of St. Vith. The 80th<br />
Infantry Division, on the right, would<br />
maintain contact during its advance with<br />
the left wing of the XII Corps. The<br />
26th Division would form the center.<br />
The 4th Armored Division would ad-<br />
vance on the left–B<strong>as</strong>togne lay in its<br />
zone.<br />
The l<strong>as</strong>t of the eleven field artillery<br />
battalions which had been taken from<br />
active engagement on the old Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> front to form the corps artillery<br />
arrived during the day. They had<br />
wheeled north at an average twenty-<br />
mile-per-hour clip. In addition the infan-<br />
try divisions each had a tank battalion<br />
and a self-propelled tank destroyer bat-<br />
talion attached. <strong>To</strong> eke out some cover<br />
on the open west flank, T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Lyon, consisting of the 178th Engineer<br />
4 Ezell’s adventure w<strong>as</strong> carefully checked at the<br />
time and is the subject of a special series of com-<br />
bat interviews.<br />
Combat Battalion with reinforcements,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>signed the t<strong>as</strong>k of erecting road-<br />
blocks and preparing bridges for dem-<br />
olition.<br />
The Third <strong>Army</strong> commander’s l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
instruction to his commanders reflected<br />
the admonition against a dribbling at-<br />
tack given by General Eisenhower: he<br />
(General Patton) favored an attack in<br />
column of regiments, “or in any c<strong>as</strong>e<br />
lots of depth.” As usual Patton w<strong>as</strong><br />
optimistic. He felt certain that the<br />
enemy w<strong>as</strong> unaware of the storm about<br />
to break, that German intelligence had<br />
not spotted the appearance of the 26th<br />
Division in the area, and that it did not<br />
know the exact location of the other<br />
two divisions. “Drive like hell,” said<br />
Patton.<br />
The 80th Division Advance<br />
Despite hurried preparations the III<br />
Corps attack got off at the appointed<br />
hour on the 22d. The 80th Division,<br />
whose regiments earlier had <strong>as</strong>sembled<br />
north of Luxembourg for the defense of<br />
that city, had <strong>as</strong> line of departure the<br />
Mersch-Arlon road on a front of five and<br />
a half miles. 5 During the night it w<strong>as</strong><br />
learned that the 109th Infantry of the<br />
dispersed 28th Division still w<strong>as</strong> facing<br />
the enemy near Vichten, five miles to<br />
the north. This would give some cover<br />
for the development of the 80th Divi-<br />
sion attack; so McBride ordered his<br />
left wing regiment to p<strong>as</strong>s through the<br />
5 Very detailed<br />
coverage of the 80th Division<br />
operation will be found in the combat interviews.<br />
The division records are less useful than the<br />
AAR’s and journals of the three infantry regi-<br />
ments. See also, Capt. Roy T. McGrann, The<br />
610th Tank Destroyer Battalion (Pittsburgh, Pa.;<br />
Geyer Printing Company, 1946).
516 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
109th Infantry, relieving it in place.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no artillery preparation (nor<br />
were t<strong>here</strong> any certain targets) for the<br />
surprise attack.<br />
The two <strong>as</strong>sault regiments, the<br />
319th Infantry on the left and the 318th<br />
Infantry on the right, went forward f<strong>as</strong>t<br />
on this cold cloudy morning, tramping<br />
over a light blanket of snow which<br />
had fallen during the night. In two hours<br />
the 319th Infantry (Col. William N.<br />
Taylor) reached Vichten and relieved<br />
the 109th; <strong>as</strong> the regiment moved on<br />
toward Merzig the first few rounds of<br />
small arms fire came in. The 318th In-<br />
fantry (Col. Lansing McVickar) headed<br />
for Ettelbruck, constricted to column<br />
formation by the Alzette River on the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t and a high ridge on the west. South<br />
of the bridgehead town enemy shellfire<br />
briefly stopped the advance until the<br />
German guns were quieted by counter-<br />
battery from the 314th Field Artillery<br />
Battalion.<br />
The cannonading w<strong>as</strong> brought on by<br />
a peculiar circumstance. The 352d Volks<br />
Grenadier Division (General Schmidt)<br />
on this morning w<strong>as</strong> advancing along<br />
the Diekirch-Ettelbruck-Merzig highway<br />
in front of but at a right angle to the<br />
American advance from the south.<br />
Schmidt w<strong>as</strong> under the impression that<br />
his division had broken through the<br />
American line and w<strong>as</strong> now marching<br />
through undefended, unoccupied coun-<br />
try. The 914th Regiment had just<br />
entered Ettelbruck when the 318th<br />
Infantry appeared. It w<strong>as</strong> the artillery<br />
regiment of the 352d, bringing up the<br />
tail of the division e<strong>as</strong>t of the town,<br />
which ran afoul of the Americans.<br />
Quite obviously the Germans did not<br />
expect an attack from this direction.<br />
The 914th faced left and deployed<br />
hurriedly, using the town <strong>as</strong> a b<strong>as</strong>e, but<br />
in the process lost its heavy metal, for<br />
the German batteries were in no posi-<br />
tion to engage in an artillery duel, and<br />
fell back to Diekirch.<br />
Farther west the rear of the 915th<br />
Regiment column w<strong>as</strong> moving directly<br />
across the 319th Infantry line of march.<br />
<strong>To</strong> their amazement, troops of the 3d<br />
Battalion suddenly saw the Germans<br />
filing p<strong>as</strong>t, only a few hundred yards<br />
away and oblivious of any danger. Tanks,<br />
tank destroyers, and the 57-mm. anti-<br />
tank guns of the 1st Battalion ended<br />
this serene promenade. Many Germans<br />
were killed, a gun battery w<strong>as</strong> blown<br />
to pieces, and numerous trucks and<br />
horse-drawn weapons were destroyed.<br />
The 319th Infantry had knifed between<br />
head and tail of the 352d. It now swung<br />
right onto the Ettelbruck road and<br />
that afternoon reached the villages of<br />
Oberfeulen and Niederfeulen. Merzig,<br />
however, remained in German hands.<br />
At sundown the 80th Division could<br />
look back on a highly successful day.<br />
Extensive gains had been the story along<br />
the entire III Corps front and Patton<br />
w<strong>as</strong> very much ple<strong>as</strong>ed. This w<strong>as</strong>, he<br />
told General Millikin, a chance to win<br />
the war: the attack must be kept rolling<br />
through the night. The 319th Infantry<br />
put its 2d Battalion, the reserve, into<br />
trucks <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Oberfeulen. T<strong>here</strong> the<br />
battalion dismounted about midnight<br />
and under a full moon began an advance<br />
to take Heiderscheid. The 318th Infan-<br />
try, which had found it difficult to ma-<br />
neuver on the constricted southern ap-<br />
proach to Ettelbruck or to bring its tanks<br />
and tank destroyers to bear against the<br />
town, at nightfall began a series of suc-<br />
cessful <strong>as</strong>saults to gain the hills which<br />
looked down upon Ettelbruck from the
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 517<br />
west. Company B moved with such speed<br />
that it reached the houses at the western<br />
edge of the town. Although its command-<br />
er w<strong>as</strong> wounded during the <strong>as</strong>sault his<br />
company held on alone. The 80th Divi-<br />
sion would have to do some bitter fight-<br />
ing before this bridgehead over the Sure<br />
and Alzette w<strong>as</strong> cleared of the enemy,<br />
but the division had cut one of the<br />
main supply routes of the German<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
One lone rifle company holding a few<br />
houses hardly made for a hand-hold on<br />
Ettelbruck. In and around the town the<br />
enemy had a grenadier regiment and<br />
many direct-fire heavy weapons. Because<br />
the bluffs surrounding the town pre-<br />
cluded much maneuver in attack, <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
on the west, or American, bank of the<br />
Alzette had to be made frontally. Lt.<br />
Col. A. S. <strong>To</strong>si had brought the two<br />
other rifle companies of his 1st Bat-<br />
talion close to the edge of the town<br />
when daylight came on the 24th (B<br />
Company still held inside), but three<br />
separate attempts to reach the town<br />
failed, and with severe c<strong>as</strong>ualties. In the<br />
afternoon a few tanks were maneu-<br />
vered into the van, and with their<br />
help the 1st Battalion reached the houses<br />
and took fifty or sixty prisoners. By this<br />
time the battalion had lost the equiva-<br />
lent of a full company, Colonel <strong>To</strong>si<br />
had been seriously wounded, and all<br />
company leaders had been killed or<br />
wounded. One tank reached the streets<br />
but found them cluttered with debris<br />
and imp<strong>as</strong>sable. The division com-<br />
mander decided to call off the attack;<br />
at dusk all of the companies withdrew<br />
while artillery pl<strong>as</strong>tered Ettelbruck.<br />
This second day had voided the bright<br />
promises of the first, for the 80th Divi-<br />
sion finally w<strong>as</strong> in contact with the main<br />
German forces, well entrenched in towns<br />
and villages which could be attacked<br />
only over broken and difficult terrain.<br />
In the course of the afternoon General<br />
McBride decided to keep the attack roll-<br />
ing by introducing his reserve regiment,<br />
the 317th, between the two attacking<br />
regiments. The 317th Infantry (Lt. Col.<br />
Henry G. Fisher), which had been<br />
following the 318th Infantry, w<strong>as</strong> given<br />
the mission of clearing the ridge which<br />
ran north to Welscheid. Once beyond<br />
this town Fisher’s troops were to turn<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t toward the Sure River, thus cutting<br />
to the rear of Ettelbruck. When night<br />
fell the regiment w<strong>as</strong> on its way, the<br />
2d Battalion in the lead and the 1st<br />
Battalion a thousand yards to its rear.<br />
Nearing Welscheid sometime after mid-<br />
night, the forward battalion started into<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sault over a series of rough slopes<br />
w<strong>here</strong> each man w<strong>as</strong> outlined by the<br />
bright moonlight reflecting from the<br />
glazed field of snow. The enemy, wait-<br />
ing with machine guns on the reverse<br />
slopes, had all the best of it. The Ameri-<br />
can tanks tried but could not maneuver<br />
over the broken ground. The battalion<br />
commander t<strong>here</strong>fore sent two of his<br />
companies to make a wide detour<br />
through a deep gorge, their place in the<br />
line being taken by the 1st Battalion.<br />
But too much time w<strong>as</strong> consumed by<br />
this movement, and day broke on the<br />
24th with the two battalions out in the<br />
open and dangerously exposed to Ger-<br />
man fire. The attack had to be aban-<br />
doned; new plans were made for<br />
byp<strong>as</strong>sing the town and striking directly<br />
at Bourscheid and the Sure River.<br />
The 319th Infantry had continued its<br />
battle by sending the 2d Battalion<br />
against Heiderscheid, which lay on the<br />
Ettelbruck-B<strong>as</strong>togne route and from
518 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
which a secondary road ran laterally<br />
west to Martelange across the 26th<br />
Division zone of advance. Just north of<br />
Heiderscheid were several crossing points<br />
on the Sure River, the chief natural<br />
obstacle to be surmounted by the 80th<br />
Division in its march northward. The<br />
2d Battalion (Lt. Col. Paul Bandy)<br />
reached Heiderscheid about 0230 on the<br />
morning of the 23d, but when two rifle<br />
companies neared the edge of the village<br />
they were stopped by <strong>as</strong>sault gun fire<br />
and machine guns firing tracers to<br />
point the targets for the gun crews. Infan-<br />
trymen with submachine guns worked<br />
close enough to fire bursts into the posi-<br />
tions from which the orange line of<br />
the tracers came but could not deal with<br />
the German <strong>as</strong>sault guns. Two American<br />
tanks belonging to the 702d Tank Bat-<br />
talion came forward only to be checked<br />
by a mine field at a crossroad. A<br />
German gun took a shot at the tanks but<br />
in so doing gave away its own location,<br />
and a quick return shot set the <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
gun afire. Guided by the light from the<br />
blazing gun carriage the American rifle-<br />
men rushed the gendarmerie, took it,<br />
and t<strong>here</strong> barricaded themselves. About<br />
this time the explosion of a German<br />
shell detonated the mine field, and the<br />
tanks ground forward to the village. An<br />
hour or so before noon the l<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
stubborn defenders had been routed<br />
out and the 2d Battalion w<strong>as</strong> north of<br />
the village.<br />
The fight w<strong>as</strong> not finished, for at noon<br />
two enemy companies converged in a<br />
yelling <strong>as</strong>sault on Heiderscheid. Some<br />
of the 2d Battalion broke but the rest<br />
stood firm, killed the German infantry<br />
commander, and wrote quietus to this<br />
threat. 6 Then affairs took a more serious<br />
6 Colonel Bandy w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC for<br />
turn <strong>as</strong> eleven enemy tanks hove in sight,<br />
decks and cupol<strong>as</strong> packed with snow for<br />
camouflage. While a hurried call w<strong>as</strong><br />
dispatched for armored aid, bazooka<br />
teams crawled forward to try their luck.<br />
Two of the enemy tanks fell prey to<br />
the bazooka teams, led by 2d Lt.<br />
Michael Hritsik, 7 w<strong>here</strong>upon the others<br />
showed themselves loath to close in.<br />
Friendly tank destroyers appeared in<br />
time to account for four more German<br />
tanks, and an American tank knocked<br />
out a fifth.<br />
By the time the 3d Battalion (Lt.<br />
Col. Elliott B. Cheston) came hurry-<br />
ing up the battle w<strong>as</strong> ended. Cheston’s<br />
battalion, having spent most of the morn-<br />
ing rounding up a large enemy detach-<br />
ment in Merzig, now turned northe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
from Heiderscheid and marched through<br />
a deep defile to reach and take the<br />
hamlet of Tadler on the Sure. The<br />
Germans blew the nearby bridge, then<br />
sat back on the far bank to pound the<br />
battalion with rocket salvos. About dark<br />
the regimental commander ordered a<br />
company to move west along the river<br />
and outpost Heiderscheidergrund; ad-<br />
mittedly this w<strong>as</strong> poaching in the<br />
zone of the 26th Division, but the bridge<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> needed. The company found<br />
the bridge intact and a stream of German<br />
vehicles running back and forth. Organ-<br />
izing an ambush, the company spent the<br />
night picking off unwary travelers.<br />
On the e<strong>as</strong>tern flank the 1st Battalion<br />
and its tank support spent most of the<br />
23d negotiating the rough ground,<br />
dense woods, and deep snow in an ad-<br />
vance from Feulen toward Kehmen.<br />
From a hill south of Kehmen the advance<br />
courageous leadership in the fighting on this day.<br />
7 Lieutenant Hritsik w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 519<br />
guard counted twenty-four tanks rolling<br />
toward the village from the e<strong>as</strong>t, ap-<br />
parently on their way to retake Heider-<br />
scheid. Word already had gone back for<br />
more tanks, but those with infantry,<br />
plus a few tank destroyers, got in the<br />
first fire, immobilized two of the leaders,<br />
and so surprised the rest that they turned<br />
tail and hurried back to Bourscheid-<br />
which the 905th Field Artillery Bat-<br />
talion promptly took under fire. Dis-<br />
cerning at le<strong>as</strong>t a tank platoon backing<br />
the grenadiers inside Kehmen, the 1st<br />
Battalion waited until after dark for<br />
reinforcements-ten tanks formerly at-<br />
tached to the 28th Infantry Division.<br />
HEIDERSHEIDERGRUND BRIDGE<br />
With their help, the battalion delivered<br />
a sharp <strong>as</strong>sault, destroying three<br />
German tanks and freeing the village.<br />
The night battles had shown clearly<br />
that the 80th Infantry Division faced<br />
hard going <strong>as</strong> the 24th dawned. The<br />
advance had carried north to a point<br />
w<strong>here</strong> it impinged on the Seventh <strong>Army</strong><br />
communications leading to the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
battleground. The main fight for the<br />
III Corps w<strong>as</strong> that flaring farther west.<br />
Henceforth McBride’s operation would<br />
be subsidiary to the attack by the corps’<br />
left and center, an operation designed<br />
to interdict the movement of reinforce-<br />
ments heading for B<strong>as</strong>togne and to
520 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
contain the enemy in the Ettelbruck and<br />
Bourscheid sectors. Orders from General<br />
Millikin, received at the 80th Division<br />
command post early on the 24th, under-<br />
lined the shift of gravity westward:<br />
McBride w<strong>as</strong> to send two battalions<br />
of the 318th Infantry from Ettelbruck<br />
to <strong>as</strong>sist the 4th Armored Division, and<br />
at once.<br />
The 26th Infantry Division Attack<br />
The 26th Division advance in the<br />
center of the III Corps zone began under<br />
circumstances similar to those in the<br />
sector of the 80th Division. 8 Before dawn<br />
on 22 December the 104th Infantry and<br />
the 328th Infantry moved from their<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembly are<strong>as</strong> e<strong>as</strong>t of Arlon to the line<br />
of departure at the Attert River. A very<br />
large number of men in the rifle companies<br />
had yet to see their first German,<br />
many of them were replacements whose<br />
only recent experience with a rifle consisted<br />
of a day or two at the Metz training<br />
ground. All had heard the current<br />
rumors of atrocities perpetrated by the<br />
German SS troops and paratroopers: all<br />
were steeled, according to the capacity<br />
of the individual, to meet a ruthless<br />
enemy.<br />
The general axis of advance w<strong>as</strong> Arlon-<br />
Wiltz; but t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no main road from<br />
the Attert north to Wiltz–indeed the<br />
advance would have to reach Eschdorf,<br />
8 The combat interviews are fragmentary for the<br />
26th Division and the historian must rely on the<br />
regimental records. The 26th Division AAR is<br />
fairly complete, but the account of the action is<br />
very terse. The only publications of value are<br />
S/Sgt. Jerome J. Theise, ed., <strong>History</strong> of the Three<br />
Hundred Twenty-Eight Infantry Regiment, From<br />
Reactivation, 12 February 1943, to VE Duy, 9 May<br />
1945 (Wels: Verlagsdruckerei, 1945; and The<br />
<strong>History</strong> of the 26th Yankee Division (Salem, 1955).<br />
seven air miles away, before it could<br />
follow a main thoroughfare. T<strong>here</strong> were<br />
numerous secondary roads and trails<br />
going north, and the attack would fan<br />
out over these. But this network became<br />
incre<strong>as</strong>ingly difficult to traverse <strong>as</strong> it<br />
descended into the ravines and through<br />
the forests leading to the gorges of the<br />
Sure River. The ground between the<br />
Sure trench and the valley of the Wiltz<br />
w<strong>as</strong> equally rugged. Since little w<strong>as</strong><br />
known of the enemy, the division plan<br />
simply called for the troops to expand<br />
over roads and trails, eliminating<br />
German resistance w<strong>here</strong>ver found.<br />
While the 26th Reconnaissance Troop<br />
rolled out <strong>as</strong> a screen several thousand<br />
yards to the fore, the 104th Infantry<br />
(Lt. Col. Ralph A. Palladino) on the<br />
right and the 328th Infantry (Col. Ben<br />
R. Jacobs) on the left marched through<br />
dense woods and over slushy, muddy<br />
trails, finally coming out onto open, roll-<br />
ing fields near the village of Pratz, about<br />
three miles by road from the Attert.<br />
Unaware of the fact, the Americans were<br />
nearing the advance guard of the 915th<br />
Regiment, marching out from Ettel-<br />
bruck. (It w<strong>as</strong> this column of the 352d<br />
Volks Grenadier Division whose tail the<br />
80th Division pinched near Merzig.)<br />
The 104th Infantry continued north,<br />
<strong>as</strong>sailed only by scattered small arms<br />
fire and machine gun bursts fired at<br />
long range. A mile farther on a small<br />
detachment of enemy tanks and infantry<br />
essayed an attack but were repelled by<br />
mortar fire.<br />
The first real test of strength came<br />
when the leading company w<strong>as</strong> a couple<br />
of miles southe<strong>as</strong>t of Grosbous, from<br />
which town a road led north to Eschdorf.<br />
Here the advance battalion of the<br />
915th Regiment struck so suddenly and
THE III CORPS' COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 521<br />
with such force that the lead company<br />
fell back for at le<strong>as</strong>t half a mile. The<br />
guns supporting the 104th Infantry were<br />
in position, however, and finally bent<br />
back the counterattack. In the mean-<br />
time a handful of riflemen from the<br />
109th Infantry, 28th Division, who had<br />
been waging a long battle in Grosbous<br />
until driven out by four German tanks,<br />
made their way back to the 104th. As<br />
it turned out the body of the 352d Volks<br />
Grenadier Division w<strong>as</strong> not present<br />
<strong>here</strong> but w<strong>as</strong> in the 80th Division zone.<br />
The 915th Regiment consisting of troops<br />
now split off from their trains, artillery,<br />
and the bulk of the division by the<br />
wedge which the 80th had thrust for-<br />
ward west of Ettelbruck, withdrew to<br />
make a stand in the neighborhood of<br />
Grosbous. Colonel Palladino left Com-<br />
pany E to hold in check some Germans<br />
who had taken to the nearby woods,<br />
while the rest of the 104th Infantry<br />
continued tramping north along the road<br />
to Grosbous. The village itself w<strong>as</strong> taken<br />
a couple of hours after midnight in a<br />
surprise attack by a combat patrol from<br />
Company G.<br />
The series of blocks thrown against<br />
the 352d Volks Grenadier Division by<br />
the 80th Division and the 104th Infantry<br />
gave the western wing of the 26th Divi-<br />
sion a clear field. By the middle of the<br />
afternoon the 328th had covered nearly<br />
six miles without firing or receiving a<br />
shot. The advance guard w<strong>as</strong> nearing<br />
the village of Arsdorf, from which a<br />
series of small roads and trails radiated<br />
through ravines and along ridges to the<br />
Sure, when a few rounds came in from<br />
self-propelled guns firing from a hill to<br />
the north. Concurrently reports arrived<br />
from the 26th Reconnaissance Troop<br />
that t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a strong German force in<br />
Rambrouch on the left flank? Night<br />
w<strong>as</strong> near and the true strength of the<br />
enemy unknown; so the regiment halted<br />
while scouts worked their way to the<br />
front and flanks.<br />
Who were these German troops? Since<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> known that the 352d Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division could not have reached<br />
this point the first guess w<strong>as</strong> that the<br />
5th Parachute Division, believed to be<br />
farther north, had pushed down into<br />
the area. Actually the 328th Infantry<br />
had run into the Fuehrer Grenadier<br />
Brigade, which the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> had<br />
borrowed from the OKW reserve, rush-<br />
ing it across the front to bolster this<br />
south flank. At first the brigade had<br />
been sent in to hold the Sure River line,<br />
but the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> then decided to<br />
expand its blocking position well to the<br />
south of the river, and so turned the<br />
brigade through Bourscheid and Esch-<br />
dorf to the neighborhood of Arsdorf.<br />
This unit contained a battalion of forty<br />
Mark IV and Panther tanks, one bat-<br />
talion of mobile infantry, and one of<br />
foot, but thus far only a few tanks and<br />
the rifle battalion in personnel carriers<br />
were on the scene.<br />
The new turn of events caused<br />
General Paul some concern about his<br />
left flank. The 4th Armored attack had<br />
carried abre<strong>as</strong>t of the line held by the<br />
328th Infantry but t<strong>here</strong> remained a<br />
gap of three miles, densely wooded, be-<br />
tween the two. As a temporary expedient<br />
a small t<strong>as</strong>k force, organized around<br />
Company K, 101st Infantry, and Com-<br />
pany A, 735th Tank Battalion, deployed<br />
to screen the open left flank of the 26th<br />
9 The American 'cavalry w<strong>as</strong> greatly outnum-<br />
bered at Rambrouch and forced to withdraw.<br />
Sgt. Lawrence L. Hatfield, whose platoon covered<br />
the withdrawal, w<strong>as</strong> given the DSC.
522 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Division. Meanwhile Paul’s two regi-<br />
ments prepared to continue the attack<br />
through the night <strong>as</strong> the army and corps<br />
commanders had ordered. The objective<br />
w<strong>as</strong> Wiltz, once the command post of<br />
the American 28th Infantry Division,<br />
and now the headquarters of the German<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> and the concentration<br />
point for enemy troops feeding in from<br />
the northe<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
While the 104th moved forward to<br />
hit the enemy congregated at Grosbous,<br />
the 328th Infantry reorganized to keep<br />
the drive going, under somewhat opti-<br />
mistic orders to seize crossings on the<br />
Wiltz River. At midnight the 1st and<br />
3d Battalions jumped off to take Grevils-<br />
Brésil, from which a fairly good ridge<br />
road ran north to Eschdorf. The village<br />
w<strong>as</strong> garrisoned by two companies of the<br />
Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade, reinforced<br />
by several Panthers from the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> reserve. Unshaken by a half-hour<br />
shelling, the Germans held tenaciously<br />
to the village all night long.<br />
When daylight came on 23 December<br />
the 26th Division had little to show for<br />
its night attack. The 104th Infantry held<br />
Grosbous, but the 328th w<strong>as</strong> checked<br />
at Grevils-Brésil by a company of stub-<br />
born German infantry backed up with<br />
a few tanks. In the woods south of<br />
Grosbous the men of Company E, 104th<br />
Infantry, had taken on more than they<br />
had bargained for: a couple of hundred<br />
riflemen from the 915th Regiment led<br />
in person by the regimental commander.<br />
(The American regimental command-<br />
er had to throw in Company I, but even<br />
so this pocket w<strong>as</strong> not wiped out until<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve.)<br />
Although the right wing of the<br />
26th Division w<strong>as</strong> driving along the<br />
boundary between the isolated forward<br />
regiment of the 352d Volks Grenadier<br />
Division and the incoming Fuehrer<br />
Grenadier Brigade, only a small part<br />
of the new brigade w<strong>as</strong> in contact with<br />
the forward American battalions early<br />
on the 23d. The German brigade com-<br />
mander had been seriously wounded by<br />
a shell fragment while reconnoitering<br />
on the previous evening, the hurried<br />
march to action had prevented unified<br />
commitment, and the heavy woods south<br />
of the Sure made control very difficult.<br />
Also t<strong>here</strong> were troubles with fuel.<br />
The LXXXV Corps hoped to repel<br />
the American attack by means of a co-<br />
ordinated counterattack south of the<br />
Sure which would develop <strong>as</strong> a pincers<br />
movement, grappling the American<br />
troops who had penetrated into the dense<br />
forest north of the Ettelbruck-Grosbous<br />
road. For this maneuver, set to open<br />
on the 23d, the new 79th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division w<strong>as</strong> to attack toward<br />
Niederfeulen, secure the Wark River,<br />
and hook to the northwest. On its right<br />
the Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade would<br />
attack in a southe<strong>as</strong>tern direction from<br />
Heiderscheid and Eschdorf with Gros-<br />
bous and union with the 915th Regi-<br />
ment <strong>as</strong> the immediate objective. This<br />
German scheme w<strong>as</strong> slow to come into<br />
operation and only a part of the Fuehrer<br />
Grenadier Brigade w<strong>as</strong> brought against<br />
the 26th Division during the 23d, and<br />
then mostly in small packets of infantry<br />
supported by a platoon or less of tanks.<br />
The two attacking regiments of the<br />
26th Division continued to fan out over<br />
secondary roads and trails, moving very<br />
cautiausly for fear of ambush <strong>as</strong> the<br />
woods thickened and pressed closer to<br />
the roadways. Here the supporting<br />
weapons came into play. Detachments of<br />
the 390th Antiaircraft Artillery Auto-
THE III CORPS' COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 523<br />
matic Weapons Battalion, moving close<br />
behind the infantry point, bl<strong>as</strong>ted at<br />
wood lines, hedges, haystacks, and farm<br />
buildings. Their .50-caliber machine<br />
guns and the 37-mm. cannon mounted<br />
on half-tracks pinned the German infan-<br />
try down until supporting artillery<br />
could be brought to bear, then shifted<br />
to a new position before the German<br />
gunners could get on target.<br />
The American cannoneers wheeled<br />
their pieces from position to position so<br />
<strong>as</strong> to give the closest support possible.<br />
At one point the commanding officer<br />
of the 102d Field Artillery Battalion,<br />
Lt. Col. R. W. Kinney, went forward<br />
alone under direct enemy fire to pick<br />
out the targets for his guns. (Kinney<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.) When an enemy<br />
pocket w<strong>as</strong> discovered in some corner<br />
of the woods the self-propelled tank<br />
destroyers went into action, spraying<br />
the enemy with high explosive. Thus<br />
a platoon of the 818th Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion ultimately bl<strong>as</strong>ted the lost bat-<br />
talion of the 913th Regiment out of the<br />
woods near Grosbous.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> no more than natural that the<br />
26th Division, full of green troops,<br />
wanted the comforting presence of<br />
friendly tanks or guns. The 735th Tank<br />
Battalion after action report says that the<br />
104th Infantry would not enter Dellen<br />
ahead of the tanks. The 328th Infantry<br />
also w<strong>as</strong> slow in moving without tanks<br />
ahead. Since through all this day the<br />
Americans had little or no idea of the<br />
enemy strength that lay ahead or per-<br />
haps lurked on the flanks, the lack of<br />
sw<strong>as</strong>hbuckling h<strong>as</strong>te w<strong>as</strong> not abnormal.<br />
The corps commander shared the feel-<br />
ing that caution w<strong>as</strong> due. At dark he<br />
ordered General Paul to keep pushing<br />
with small patrols but enjoined him to<br />
keep the m<strong>as</strong>s of the two regiments<br />
(the third w<strong>as</strong> corps reserve) from get-<br />
ting too far forward. Patrols, Millikin<br />
advised, should try to get to the Sure<br />
River bridges before daylight of the<br />
24th. As things now stood, the 80th Divi-<br />
sion had pushed a salient ahead on the<br />
right of the 26th Division in the Keh-<br />
men sector and w<strong>as</strong> waiting for the cen-<br />
ter division to come abre<strong>as</strong>t. On the left<br />
t<strong>here</strong> remained a fair-sized gap be-<br />
tween the 4th Armored Division and<br />
the 26th, only partially screened by very<br />
small detachments at roadblock posi-<br />
tions. Thus far the enemy had failed to<br />
recognize or exploit this gap.<br />
The 4th Armored Division Attack<br />
On 21 December the 4th Armored<br />
Division, then <strong>as</strong>sembled in the Leglise-<br />
Arlon area, learned what its mission<br />
would be when the III Corps attacked<br />
on the 22d: advance north and relieve<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. 10 Martelange, an outpost of<br />
the VIII Corps engineer barrier line<br />
on the Sure River, w<strong>as</strong> twelve miles on<br />
a hard-surfaced highway from the<br />
center of B<strong>as</strong>togne. A Sherman tank<br />
could make it from Martelange to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne in a half hour–if the road w<strong>as</strong><br />
10 With the exception of those conducted with<br />
the 101st Airborne Division, the combat inter-<br />
views with the 4th Armored Division are the most<br />
informative of all those bearing on the battle<br />
at B<strong>as</strong>togne. The 4th Armored AAR and G–3<br />
journal provide little exact or detailed information.<br />
The combat command AARs and journals remedy<br />
this lack. Each battalion h<strong>as</strong> either an AAR or<br />
unit journal. See also K. A. Koyen, The Fourth<br />
Armored Division (Munich, 1945); Lt. Col. D. M.<br />
Oden, 4th Armored Division-Relief of the 101st<br />
Airborne Division, B<strong>as</strong>togne, Pamphlet Series,<br />
Command and General Staff College, 1947; <strong>History</strong><br />
of the Ninety-Fourth Armored Field Artillery<br />
Battalion (n.d., n.p.); and The Armored School<br />
MS, Armor at B<strong>as</strong>togne (May 1949).
524 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sable and if the enemy confined his<br />
opposition to loosing rifle and machine<br />
gun bursts. The t<strong>as</strong>k at hand, however,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to “destroy the enemy in zone” and<br />
cover the open west flank of the corps.<br />
<strong>Of</strong> the three divisions aligned to jump<br />
off in the III Corps counterattack, the<br />
4th Armored would come under the<br />
closest scrutiny by the Third <strong>Army</strong> com-<br />
mander. Its mission w<strong>as</strong> dramatic. It<br />
w<strong>as</strong> also definite, geographically speak-<br />
ing, and so lent itself the more readily<br />
to <strong>as</strong>sessment on the map in terms of<br />
success or failure. Furthermore, the rep-<br />
utation of the 4th Armored <strong>as</strong> a sl<strong>as</strong>h-<br />
ing, wheeling outfit would naturally<br />
attract attention, even though its maté-<br />
riel w<strong>as</strong> not up to par, either in amount<br />
or mechanical fitness, and many green<br />
troops were riding in its tanks and infan-<br />
try half-tracks. <strong>To</strong> all this must be added<br />
a less tangible item in evaluating readi-<br />
ness for battle. General Gaffey, the<br />
division commander, w<strong>as</strong> a relative new-<br />
comer to this veteran and closely knit<br />
fighting team; he had <strong>as</strong> yet to lead the<br />
entire division in combat. CCA likewise<br />
had a commander who w<strong>as</strong> a stranger<br />
to the division, Brig. Gen. Herbert L.<br />
Earnest. It might be expected, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
that the 4th Armored would take some<br />
little time in growing accustomed to the<br />
new leaders and their ways of conduct-<br />
ing battle.<br />
Theoretically the VIII Corps covered<br />
the western flank of the III Corps, but<br />
on 22 December the situation in Middle-<br />
ton’s area w<strong>as</strong> so fluid and his forces<br />
were so weak that no definite boundary<br />
or contact existed between the VIII and<br />
III Corps. The actual zone of operations<br />
for the 4th Armored Division, t<strong>here</strong>fore,<br />
proved to be an area delimited by Bigon-<br />
ville on the e<strong>as</strong>t and Neufchâteau on<br />
the west, a front of over fifteen miles.<br />
The mission <strong>as</strong>signed the 4th Armored,<br />
rather than zones and boundaries, deter-<br />
mined the commitment of the division<br />
and the routes it would employ.<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne could be reached from the<br />
south by two main approaches, on the<br />
right the Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne road, on<br />
the left the Neufchâteau-B<strong>as</strong>togne road.<br />
General Millikin and the III Corps staff<br />
preferred the Arlon route, at whose en-<br />
trance the 4th Armored already w<strong>as</strong><br />
poised. General Middleton, whose VIII<br />
Corps nominally controlled the troops<br />
in B<strong>as</strong>togne, favored a broad thrust to<br />
employ both routes but with the weight<br />
placed on the Neufchâteau road. The<br />
Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne road w<strong>as</strong> the shortest by<br />
a few miles and on the most direct line<br />
from the III Corps <strong>as</strong>sembly area. <strong>To</strong><br />
control the Arlon approach would block<br />
the reinforcement of the enemy troops<br />
already south of B<strong>as</strong>togne. Attack on<br />
this axis also would allow the left and<br />
center divisions of the III Corps to main-<br />
tain a somewhat closer contact with<br />
each other. The Neufchâteau-B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
route, on the other hand, w<strong>as</strong> less tightly<br />
controlled by the enemy, although t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> some evidence that German strength<br />
w<strong>as</strong> building up in that direction.<br />
The problem facing the III Corps<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not the simple one of gaining access<br />
to B<strong>as</strong>togne or of restoring physical con-<br />
tact with the forces t<strong>here</strong>in, contact<br />
which had existed <strong>as</strong> late <strong>as</strong> 20 Decem-<br />
ber. The problem w<strong>as</strong>: (a) to restore<br />
and maintain a permanent corridor into<br />
the city; and (b) to jar the surrounding<br />
enemy loose so that B<strong>as</strong>togne and its<br />
road net could be used by the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> <strong>as</strong> a b<strong>as</strong>e for further operations<br />
to the north and northe<strong>as</strong>t. The problem<br />
w<strong>as</strong> well understood by the 4th
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 525<br />
Armored Division. General Gaffey’s<br />
letter of instructions to General Dager,<br />
commanding CCB, said, “ . . . you will<br />
drive in, relieve the force, and proceed<br />
[italics supplied] from B<strong>as</strong>togne to the<br />
NE. . . .” The impression held by 4th<br />
Armored commanders and staff w<strong>as</strong> that<br />
an independent tank column could cut<br />
its way through to the city (“at any<br />
time,” said Dager), but that the open-<br />
ing of a corridor equivalent to the width<br />
of the road bed would be self-sealing<br />
once the thin-skinned or light armored<br />
columns started north to resupply and<br />
reinforce the heavy armor which reached<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. The mission set the 4th<br />
Armored would require the co-ordinated<br />
efforts of the entire division, nor could<br />
it be fulfilled by a dramatic ride to the<br />
rescue of the B<strong>as</strong>togne garrison,<br />
although this may have been what Gen-<br />
eral Patton had in mind.<br />
The Third <strong>Army</strong> commander, veteran<br />
tanker, himself prescribed the tactics to<br />
be used by Gaffey and the 4th Armored.<br />
The attack should lead off with the<br />
tanks, artillery, tank destroyers, and<br />
armored engineers in the van. The main<br />
body of armored infantry should be<br />
kept back. When stiff resistance w<strong>as</strong><br />
encountered, envelopment tactics should<br />
be used: no close-in envelopment<br />
should be attempted; all envelopments<br />
should be started a mile or a mile and<br />
a half mile back and be made at right<br />
angles. Patton, whose experience against<br />
the Panther tank during the Lorraine<br />
campaign had made him keenly aware<br />
of its superiority over the American<br />
Sherman in gun and armor, ordered<br />
that the new, modified Sherman with<br />
heavier armor (the so-called Jumbo)<br />
should be put in the lead when available.<br />
But t<strong>here</strong> were very few of the Jumbos<br />
in the Third <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
At 0600 on 22 December (H-hour for<br />
the III Corps counterattack) two combat<br />
commands stood ready behind a line of<br />
departure which stretched from Habay-<br />
la-Neuve e<strong>as</strong>t to Niedercolpach. General<br />
Gaffey planned to send CCA and CCB<br />
into the attack abre<strong>as</strong>t, CCA working<br />
along the main Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne road<br />
while CCB advanced on secondary roads<br />
to the west. In effect the two commands<br />
would be traversing parallel ridge lines.<br />
Although the full extent of damage done<br />
the roads and bridges during the VIII<br />
Corps withdrawal w<strong>as</strong> not yet clear, it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> known that the Sure bridges at<br />
Martelange had been blown. In the<br />
event that CCA w<strong>as</strong> delayed unduly at<br />
the Sure crossing CCB might be switched<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t and take the lead on the main<br />
road. In any c<strong>as</strong>e CCB w<strong>as</strong> scheduled<br />
to lead the 4th Armored Division into<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
On the right CCA (General Earnest)<br />
moved out behind A Troop of the 25th<br />
Cavalry Squadron in two t<strong>as</strong>k forces of<br />
battalion size. Visibility w<strong>as</strong> poor, the<br />
ground w<strong>as</strong> snow-covered, but the<br />
tracked vehicles were able to move with-<br />
out difficulty over the frozen terrain-<br />
without difficulty, that is, until the e<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
ern t<strong>as</strong>k force commenced to encounter<br />
demolitions executed earlier by the VIII<br />
Corps engineers. The upshot w<strong>as</strong> that<br />
both t<strong>as</strong>k forces converged on the main<br />
Arlon road and proceeded <strong>as</strong> a single<br />
column. Near Martelange a large crater<br />
delayed the column for some time. Short-<br />
ly after noon it w<strong>as</strong> bridged and the<br />
advance guard became embroiled in a<br />
fire fight with a rifle company of the<br />
15th Regiment (5th Parachute Divi-<br />
sion) guarding the bridges, now de-<br />
molished, at Martelange. The town,
526 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
sprawling on a series of terraces rising<br />
from the river, w<strong>as</strong> too large for effective<br />
artillery fire and the enemy riflemen<br />
held on until about 0300 the next morn-<br />
ing when, unaccountably, they allowed a<br />
company of armored infantry to cross<br />
on one of the broken spans. Most of<br />
the 23d w<strong>as</strong> spent in bridging the Sure.<br />
The width and depth of the cut through<br />
which the stream flowed forbade the<br />
use of either ponton or treadway. Corps<br />
engineers came up to fabricate a 90-foot<br />
Bailey bridge, but it w<strong>as</strong> afternoon be-<br />
fore the tanks could start moving. De-<br />
lays, however, had not dimmed the<br />
general impression that CCA could cut<br />
its way through to B<strong>as</strong>togne in short<br />
order, and at 1500 the III Corps sent<br />
word to Middleton that contact with<br />
the 101st w<strong>as</strong> expected “by tonight.”<br />
On the lesser roads to the west,<br />
General Dager’s CCB, which had started<br />
out at 0430, also w<strong>as</strong> delayed by demoli-<br />
tions. Nonetheless at noon of the 22d<br />
the 8th Tank Battalion w<strong>as</strong> in sight of<br />
Burnon, only seven miles from B<strong>as</strong>togne,<br />
nor w<strong>as</strong> t<strong>here</strong> evidence that the enemy<br />
could make a stand. Here orders came<br />
from General Patton: the advance w<strong>as</strong><br />
to be continued through the night “to<br />
relieve B<strong>as</strong>togne.” 11 Then ensued the<br />
usual delay: still another bridge de-<br />
stroyed during the withdrawal had to be<br />
replaced, and it w<strong>as</strong> p<strong>as</strong>t midnight when<br />
light tanks and infantry cleared a small<br />
German rear guard from Burnon itself.<br />
Wary of German bazook<strong>as</strong> in this<br />
wooded country, tanks and cavalry jeeps<br />
moved cautiously over the frozen ground<br />
toward Chaumont, the next sizable vil-<br />
11 Patton, in his book, War As I Knew It (page<br />
201), admits that his order for day and night<br />
attack by the armor w<strong>as</strong> an error.<br />
lage. Thus far the column had been sub-<br />
ject only to small arms fire, although<br />
a couple of jeeps had been lost to Ger-<br />
man bazook<strong>as</strong>. But when the cavalry and<br />
light tanks neared Chaumont antitank<br />
guns knocked out one of the tanks and<br />
the advance guard withdrew to the main<br />
body, deployed on a ridge south of the<br />
village. Daylight w<strong>as</strong> near. CCB had<br />
covered only about a quarter of a mile<br />
during the night, but because Chaumont<br />
appeared to be guarded by German guns<br />
on the flanking hills a formal, time-<br />
consuming, co-ordinated attack seemed<br />
necessary.<br />
During the morning the 10th Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion and the twenty-two<br />
Shermans of the 8th Tank Battalion that<br />
were in fighting condition organized for<br />
a sweep around Chaumont to west and<br />
north, coupled with a direct punch to<br />
drive the enemy out of the village. <strong>To</strong><br />
keep the enemy occupied, an armored<br />
field artillery battalion shelled the<br />
houses. Then, <strong>as</strong> the morning fog cleared<br />
away, fighter-bombers from the XIX<br />
Tactical Air Command (a trusted friend<br />
of the 4th Armored Division) detoured<br />
from their main mission of covering the<br />
cargo planes flying supplies to B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
and hammered Chaumont, pausing<br />
briefly for a dogfight with Luftwaffe<br />
intruders <strong>as</strong> tankers and infantry be-<br />
low formed a spellbound audience.<br />
While CCB paused south of Chau-<br />
mont and CCA waited for the Marte-<br />
lange bridge to be finished, the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> commander fretted at the delay.<br />
He telephoned the III Corps headquar-<br />
ters: “T<strong>here</strong> is too much piddling<br />
around. Byp<strong>as</strong>s these towns and clear<br />
them up later. Tanks can operate on this<br />
ground now.” It w<strong>as</strong> clear to all that<br />
General Patton’s eye w<strong>as</strong> on the 4th
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 527<br />
WATCHING A DOGFIGHT BETWEEN AMERICAN AND LUFTWAFFE PLANES<br />
Armored Division and his erstwhile<br />
chief of staff, General Gaffey, and that<br />
he counted on the 4th Armored to cut<br />
its way into B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
At Chaumont the ground <strong>as</strong>sault came<br />
about 1330 on the heels of a particularly<br />
telling strike by friendly fighter-bombers.<br />
German artillery had begun to come<br />
alive an hour or so earlier, but with<br />
the Jubos in the sky the enemy gunners<br />
were quiet. Two rifle platoons mounted<br />
on tanks made a d<strong>as</strong>h into the village,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> more of the armored infantry<br />
soon arrived on foot. Even so, the lunge<br />
to envelop Chaumont on the west failed<br />
of its intent for the fields were thawing<br />
in the afternoon sun and the Shermans<br />
were left churning in the mud. A com-<br />
pany of the 14th Regiment, 5th Para-<br />
chute Division, tried to fight it out in<br />
the houses, but after a couple of hours<br />
nearly all the enemy had been rounded<br />
up. Then the scene changed with some<br />
abruptness.<br />
During the night a liaison officer carry-<br />
ing the CCB attack orders had taken<br />
the wrong turning and driven into the<br />
German lines. Perhaps the enemy had<br />
seized the orders before they could be<br />
destroyed. Perhaps the cavalry foray in<br />
the early morning had given advance<br />
warning. In any c<strong>as</strong>e General Kokott,
528 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
commanding the 26th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division responsible for the Chaumont-<br />
Martelange sector, had taken steps to<br />
reply to the attack on Chaumont. This<br />
village lies at the bottom of a bowl<br />
whose sides are formed by hills and<br />
connecting ridges. The rim to the north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t is densely wooded but is tapped<br />
by a trail leading on to the north. Along<br />
this trail, screened by the woods, the<br />
Germans brought up the 11th Assault<br />
Gun Brigade, numbering ten to fifteen<br />
remodeled Mark III carriages. bearing<br />
75-mm. guns and with riflemen clinging<br />
to their decks and sides. Rolling down<br />
the slope behind an artillery smoke<br />
screen, the German <strong>as</strong>sault guns knocked<br />
out those American tanks they could<br />
sight and discharged their gray-clad<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sengers into the village.<br />
The American riflemen (Lt. Col.<br />
Harold Cohen’s 10th Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion) battled beside the crippled<br />
and mired tanks in what Maj. Albin<br />
Irzyk, the veteran commander of the<br />
9th Tank Battalion, called the bitterest<br />
fighting his battalion ever had encoun-<br />
tered. The forward artillery observer<br />
w<strong>as</strong> dead and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no quick means<br />
of bringing fire on the enemy <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns, which simply stood off and bl<strong>as</strong>ted<br />
a road for the German infantry. Com-<br />
4TH ARMORED DIVISION ROLLING TOWARD CHAUMONT p<strong>as</strong>t the bodies of American<br />
soldiers.
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 529<br />
pany A, 10th Armored Infantry Bat-<br />
talion, which had led the original <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
against Chaumont, lost some sixty-five<br />
men. The battle soon ended. 12 In small<br />
groups the Americans fell back through<br />
the dusk to their original positions, leav-<br />
ing eleven Shermans <strong>as</strong> victims of the <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault guns and the mud. The only officer<br />
of Company A left alive, 1st Lt. Charles<br />
R. Gniot, stayed behind to cover the<br />
withdrawal until he too w<strong>as</strong> killed. Gniot<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC, posthumously.<br />
At the hour when the CCB <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
first reached Chaumont, the e<strong>as</strong>tern com-<br />
bat command had started moving across<br />
the Martelange bridge. Since it would<br />
take a long while for the whole column<br />
to close up and cross, General Earnest<br />
ordered Lt. Col. Delk Oden, commander<br />
of the 35th Tank Battalion, to forge<br />
ahead with his t<strong>as</strong>k force in a bid to<br />
reach B<strong>as</strong>togne. The road ahead climbed<br />
out of the valley and onto a chain of<br />
ridges, these ridges closely flanked by<br />
higher ground so that the pavement ran<br />
through a series of cuts that limited<br />
maneuver off the road. The cavalry point<br />
had just gained the ridge line when, at a<br />
sharp bend, the Germans opened fire.<br />
Fortunately the tank company following<br />
w<strong>as</strong> able to leave the highway and find<br />
cover behind the rise to the west of the<br />
pavement. For half an hour artillery<br />
worked over the enemy location, and<br />
then the artillery observer with the tanks<br />
“walked” the fire along the successive<br />
ridges while the tanks moved north in<br />
defilade. At the same time the half-tracks<br />
12 The story of this fight at Chaumont is con-<br />
fused. As many <strong>as</strong> twenty-two “tanks” were<br />
reported by the Americans, and these are alleged<br />
to have swept in from west, north, and e<strong>as</strong>t. See<br />
combat interviews; CCB S–2 Jnl; and MS # B–023<br />
(Heilmann) .<br />
of Company G, 51st Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion, clanked forward along the<br />
pavement.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> growing dark. Oden brought<br />
his light tank company and <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
(used throughout the B<strong>as</strong>togne relief<br />
<strong>as</strong> medium tanks) abre<strong>as</strong>t of the medium<br />
tank company with orders to continue<br />
the advance through the night. The head<br />
of the t<strong>as</strong>k force now w<strong>as</strong> close<br />
to the village of Warnach, which lay to<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t of the main road. The light<br />
tanks had just come in sight of the village<br />
when the company of armored infantry<br />
appeared around a bend in the main<br />
road. The Germans in Warnach, ap-<br />
parently waiting for such a thin-skinned<br />
target, knocked out the first two half-<br />
tracks. <strong>To</strong> byp<strong>as</strong>s the village at night<br />
w<strong>as</strong> out of the question. While the <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault guns shelled the houses a light<br />
tank platoon and a rifle platoon went in.<br />
Only one of the tanks got out, although<br />
most of the foot troops finally straggled<br />
back. Shortly after midnight a company<br />
of Shermans tried to get into Warnach<br />
but were stopped by antitank fire. Mean-<br />
while tanks and infantry of the t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force pushed on to the north, clearing<br />
the woods on either side of the main<br />
highway (the leading tank company<br />
ended up in a marsh).<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> daylight when tanks and infan-<br />
try resumed the <strong>as</strong>sault at Warnach,<br />
driving in from three sides with the<br />
riflemen clinging to the tanks. The bat-<br />
tle which ensued w<strong>as</strong> the most bitter<br />
fought by CCA during the whole<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne operation. Heilmann, com-<br />
manding the 5th Parachute Division,<br />
had re<strong>as</strong>oned that the sector he held<br />
south of B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>as</strong> far too wide for<br />
a connected linear defense, and so had<br />
concentrated the 15th Parachute Regi-
530 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
ment along the Martelange-B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
road. Warnach w<strong>as</strong> the regimental com-<br />
mand post and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> at le<strong>as</strong>t one<br />
rifle battalion in the village, reinforced<br />
by a battery of self-propelled tank<br />
destroyers. Two American artillery bat-<br />
talions kept this enemy force down, firing<br />
with speed and accuracy <strong>as</strong> the Shermans<br />
swept in, but once the artillery lifted,<br />
a house-to-house battle royal commenced<br />
in earnest. Four Shermans were de-<br />
stroyed by tank destroyer fire at close<br />
range. The enemy infantry fought des-<br />
perately, filtering back into houses<br />
which had been cleared, organizing<br />
short, savage rushes to retake lost build-<br />
ings, and showing little t<strong>as</strong>te for sur-<br />
render. But try <strong>as</strong> they might the Ger-<br />
man paratroopers could not get p<strong>as</strong>t the<br />
American armored infantry and at the<br />
tanks-only one w<strong>as</strong> knocked out by Ger-<br />
man bazooka fire. The result w<strong>as</strong> slow<br />
to be seen but none the less certain. At<br />
noon, when the battle ended, the Amer-<br />
icans had killed one hundred and thirty-<br />
five Germans and taken an equal num-<br />
ber of prisoners. The little village cost<br />
them sixty-eight officers and men, dead<br />
and wounded.<br />
Chaumont, on the 23d, and Warnach,<br />
on the 24th, are tabbed in the journals<br />
of the 4th Armored <strong>as</strong> “hot spots” on<br />
the march to B<strong>as</strong>togne. Quite unexpect-<br />
edly, however, a third developed at<br />
Bigonville, a village some two and a<br />
half miles e<strong>as</strong>t of the B<strong>as</strong>togne highway<br />
close to the boundary between the 4th<br />
Armored and the 26th Infantry Division.<br />
The gap between these divisions, only<br />
partially screened by light forces, sud-<br />
denly became a matter of more than<br />
normal concern on the Eight of 22 De-<br />
cember with reports that a large body of<br />
German armor w<strong>as</strong> moving in (actually<br />
the advance guard of the Fuehrer<br />
Grenadier Brigade which had appeared<br />
in front of the left wing of the 26th<br />
Division). <strong>To</strong> protect CCA’s open right<br />
flank, Gaffey ordered Col. Wendell<br />
Blanchard to form the Reserve Combat<br />
Command <strong>as</strong> a balanced t<strong>as</strong>k force (using<br />
the 53d Armored Infantry Battalion and<br />
37th Tank Battalion) and advance to-<br />
ward Bigonville. Early on 23 December<br />
CCR left Quatre-Vents, followed the<br />
main road nearly to Martelange, then<br />
turned right onto a secondary road which<br />
angled northe<strong>as</strong>t. This road w<strong>as</strong> “sheer<br />
ice” and much time w<strong>as</strong> consumed<br />
moving the column forward.<br />
About noon the advance guard came<br />
under fire from a small plot of woods<br />
near a crossroads at which point CCR<br />
would have to turn due north. The<br />
accompanying artillery battalion went<br />
into action, pouring high explosive into<br />
the woods for nearly an hour. One rifle<br />
company then dismounted and went in<br />
to clean out the survivors. The company<br />
found no serious resistance, returned to<br />
the road, and w<strong>as</strong> just mounting its half-<br />
tracks when a fusillade of bullets burst<br />
from the little wood. Apparently the<br />
enemy had withdrawn during the shell-<br />
ing, only to return at the heels of the<br />
departing Americans. Tanks were now<br />
sent toward the crossroad but were<br />
stopped by mines. All this had been<br />
time-consuming. Bigonville w<strong>as</strong> still a<br />
mile away, and Blanchard ordered a<br />
halt. The enemy in the woods continued<br />
to inflict c<strong>as</strong>ualties on the troops halted<br />
beside the road. Even the tankers were<br />
not immune-nearly all of the tank com-<br />
manders of one company were picked<br />
off by rifle fire.<br />
In the course of the night the Germans<br />
left the wood and fell back to the shelter
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 531<br />
of the stone houses in Bigonville. The<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault on the morning of the 24th fol-<br />
lowed what had become standard tactics<br />
with the 4th Armored. First came a short<br />
concentration fired by the artillery.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> followed an advance into the vil-<br />
lage by two teams, each composed of one<br />
tank and one infantry company working<br />
closely together. As at Chaumont and<br />
Warnach t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little trouble from<br />
the enemy artillery, for by this time the<br />
5th Parachute Division w<strong>as</strong> rationed to<br />
only seven rounds per howitzer a day.<br />
Mostly the German infantry held their<br />
fire until the Americans were in the<br />
streets, then cut loose with their bazoo-<br />
k<strong>as</strong>, light mortars, and small arms. While<br />
the two <strong>as</strong>sault companies of the 53d<br />
advanced from house to house the tanks<br />
of the 37th bl<strong>as</strong>ted the buildings ahead,<br />
machine-gunned the Germans when they<br />
broke into the open, and set barns and<br />
out-buildings afire with tracer bullets.<br />
One team burst through to the northern<br />
exit road and the garrison w<strong>as</strong> trapped.<br />
By 1100 the village w<strong>as</strong> clear. Most of<br />
the 328 prisoners taken <strong>here</strong> were from<br />
the 13th Parachute Regiment, which had<br />
just been rele<strong>as</strong>ed from its flank guard<br />
positions farther to the e<strong>as</strong>t on Heil-<br />
mann’s insistence that the 5th Parachute<br />
Division could not possibly block the<br />
American drive north with only two of<br />
its regiments in hand.<br />
The pitched battles at Bigonville and<br />
Warnach on 24 December made a con-<br />
siderable dent in the front line fighting<br />
strength of the 5th Parachute Division<br />
but failed to bring CCR and CCA<br />
appreciably closer to B<strong>as</strong>togne. CCB, the<br />
most advanced of the combat commands,<br />
had only two platoons of medium tanks<br />
left after the affair at Chaumont and<br />
had spent the day quietly waiting for<br />
replacement tanks from the repair<br />
echelons and for the rest of the division<br />
to draw abre<strong>as</strong>t. Meanwhile the Ameri-<br />
can paratroopers and their heterogene-<br />
ous comrades inside the B<strong>as</strong>togne perim-<br />
eter fought and waited, confining their<br />
radio messages to oblique hints that the<br />
4th Armored should get a move on.<br />
Thus, at the close of the 23d McAuliffe<br />
sent the message: “Sorry I did not get<br />
to shake hands today. I w<strong>as</strong> disap-<br />
pointed.” A less formal exhortation from<br />
one of his staff reached the 4th Armored<br />
command post at midnight: “T<strong>here</strong> is<br />
only one more shopping day before<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong>!”<br />
Perhaps a few of the armored officers<br />
still believed that a hell-for-leather tank<br />
attack could cleave a way to B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
But by the evening of 24 December it<br />
seemed to both Gaffey and Millikin that<br />
tanks were bound to meet tough going<br />
in frontal attack on the hard-surfaced<br />
roads to which they were confined and<br />
that the operation would demand more<br />
use of the foot-slogger, particularly since<br />
the German infantry showed a marked<br />
proclivity for stealing back into the vil-<br />
lages nominally “taken” by the tankers.<br />
Attack around the clock, enjoined by<br />
General Patton, had not been notably<br />
successful so far <strong>as</strong> the tank arm w<strong>as</strong><br />
concerned. From commander down, the<br />
4th Armored w<strong>as</strong> opposed to further<br />
use of the weakened tank battalions in<br />
hours of darkness. Further, night attacks<br />
by the two infantry divisions had failed<br />
to achieve any unusual gains and the<br />
troops were tiring.<br />
The corps commander t<strong>here</strong>fore<br />
ordered that his divisions hold during<br />
the night of the 24th in preparation for<br />
attack early on Christm<strong>as</strong> day. Two bat-<br />
talions of the 318th Infantry were join-
532<br />
ing the 4th Armored to give the needed<br />
infantry strength in the corps’ main<br />
effort. Reinforcement by the fighter-<br />
bombers had been requested (Gaffey<br />
<strong>as</strong>ked the corps for high-priority flights<br />
over the 4th Armored <strong>as</strong> a Christm<strong>as</strong><br />
present), and good flying weather<br />
seemed likely. On the debit side t<strong>here</strong><br />
were indications that reinforcements<br />
were arriving to bolster the German line<br />
facing the III Corps.<br />
Thus far the Third <strong>Army</strong> counter-<br />
attack had tended to be a slugging<br />
match with frontal <strong>as</strong>sault and little<br />
maneuver. General Patton’s insistence<br />
on byp<strong>as</strong>sing centers of resistance had<br />
been negated by the terrain, the weather,<br />
and the wide-reaching impact of the<br />
earlier VIII Corps demolitions scheme.<br />
Perhaps the pace could be speeded up<br />
by maneuver, now that the enemy had<br />
been drawn into the defense of the<br />
Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne approach. At Gaffey’s<br />
request the III Corps commander<br />
shifted the boundary between the 4th<br />
Armored and the 26th Division, making<br />
the infantry division responsible for the<br />
Bigonville sector and rele<strong>as</strong>ing CCR,<br />
on the night of the 24th, for employ-<br />
ment on the open west flank of the<br />
corps with entry into B<strong>as</strong>togne <strong>as</strong> its<br />
primary mission.<br />
The 80th Division Battle in the Woods<br />
24–26 December<br />
On the morning of 24 December the<br />
80th Division lost the two battalions<br />
pre-empted by the corps commander <strong>as</strong><br />
infantry reinforcement for the 4th<br />
Armored Division. This diminution in<br />
its rifle strength and successive collisions<br />
with German units crossing the front<br />
en route to the B<strong>as</strong>togne sector in the<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
west constituted the closest link the 80th<br />
Division would have with the dramatic<br />
effort being made to reach the en-<br />
circled 101st Airborne. From this time<br />
forward the 80th Division attack would<br />
be related to the fighting farther west<br />
only in that it w<strong>as</strong> blocking the efforts<br />
of the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> to move its reserves<br />
into the B<strong>as</strong>togne area.<br />
For the next three days the division<br />
would wage a lone battle to reach and<br />
cross the Sure River, the scene of action<br />
being limited to the wedge formed on<br />
the north by the Sure and on the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
by the Sauer River with a b<strong>as</strong>e rep-<br />
resented by the Ettelbruck–Heider-<br />
scheidergrund road. This area the 80th<br />
came to know <strong>as</strong> the Bourscheid triangle.<br />
Within this frame lay thick forests,<br />
deep ravines, and m<strong>as</strong>ked ridges, the<br />
whole a checkerboard of little terrain<br />
compartments. Control of a force larger<br />
than the battalion would be most diffi-<br />
cult, artillery support-except at clear-<br />
ings and villages-would be ineffective,<br />
and the maintenance of an interlocking,<br />
impervious front nigh impossible. Once<br />
a battalion cleared a compartment and<br />
advanced to the next the enemy could<br />
be counted on to seep back to his original<br />
position. Unobserved fire and loss of<br />
direction in the deep woods, down the<br />
blind draws, and along the twisting<br />
ridges made each American unit a poten-<br />
tial threat to its neighbors, often forcing<br />
the use of a single battalion at a time.<br />
The infantryman would be duly thank-<br />
ful when tanks, tank destroyers, or<br />
artillery could give a hand or at le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
encourage by their presence, but the<br />
battle in woods and ravines w<strong>as</strong> his own.<br />
On the 23d the enemy forces facing<br />
the 80th Division were so weak and so<br />
disorganized that the Seventh <strong>Army</strong>
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE<br />
commander, Brandenberger, had feared<br />
that the 80th Division would drive<br />
across the Sure during the course of the<br />
night and sever the main line of com-<br />
munications leading to the west. By the<br />
morning of the 24th, however, rein-<br />
forcements had arrived and the threat<br />
of a clean, quick American penetration<br />
w<strong>as</strong> on the wane. The LXXXV Corps<br />
(Kniess) thus far had faced the Ameri-<br />
can III Corps with only two divisions,<br />
the 5th Parachute and the 352d. De-<br />
spite the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> apprehension<br />
that two divisions would not possibly<br />
hold the long blocking line from Ettel-<br />
bruck to Vaux-lez-Rosihres and despite<br />
daily requests that OKW rele<strong>as</strong>e addi-<br />
tional divisions to the army to strengthen<br />
this line, the German High Command<br />
w<strong>as</strong> slow to dip into its strategic reserve.<br />
The two larger units earmarked<br />
for employment by the Seventh <strong>Army</strong><br />
were the Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade<br />
and the 79th Volks Grenadier Division.<br />
Both were a considerable distance to the<br />
rear and both were equipped with the<br />
conglomeration of makeshift, battle-<br />
weary vehicles that w<strong>as</strong> the lot of those<br />
divisions not scheduled to join in the<br />
original breakthrough and penetration.<br />
Even when they were rele<strong>as</strong>ed from the<br />
OKW Reserve, it would be a matter<br />
of days-not hours-before the m<strong>as</strong>s of<br />
either unit could be placed in the front<br />
lines. When OKW finally responded to<br />
the ple<strong>as</strong> of the Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, the most<br />
optimistic estimates placed the Fuehrer<br />
Grenadier Brigade and the 79th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division in the LXXXV<br />
Corps area on the morning of 23 Decem-<br />
ber.<br />
Neither of these two formations w<strong>as</strong><br />
rated <strong>as</strong> having a high combat value.<br />
Theoretically the Fuehrer Grenadier<br />
533<br />
Brigade, a younger brother of the elite<br />
Grossdeutschland Panzer Division and<br />
like it charged with guarding Hitler’s<br />
headquarters (albeit <strong>as</strong> the outer guard),<br />
should have been one of the first of the<br />
Wehrmacht formations. In fact this bri-<br />
gade w<strong>as</strong> of very recent vintage, had<br />
suffered intense losses in E<strong>as</strong>t Prussia<br />
during its single commitment <strong>as</strong> a unit,<br />
and w<strong>as</strong> not fully refitted when finally<br />
sent marching to the west. Replacements,<br />
drawn from the same pool <strong>as</strong> those for<br />
the Grossdeutschland and the Fuehrer<br />
Begleit Brigade, were handpicked<br />
from the younger cl<strong>as</strong>ses but had little<br />
training. The Fuehrer Grenadier Bri-<br />
gade numbered some six thousand men,<br />
had a rifle regiment mounted on ar-<br />
mored half-tracks and 1½-ton trucks, a<br />
reconnaissance battalion, an <strong>as</strong>sault gun<br />
battalion, and a mixed tank battalion<br />
made up of Mark IV’s and Panthers.<br />
The 79th Volks Grenadier Division pos-<br />
sessed an old Wehrmacht number but,<br />
<strong>as</strong> it stood at the time of its commit-<br />
ment in the Ardennes, w<strong>as</strong> a green divi-<br />
sion the bulk of whose riflemen had<br />
been combed out of headquarters troops<br />
in early December. Woefully under-<br />
strength in both transportation and sup-<br />
porting weapons, it had neither a flak<br />
battalion nor an <strong>as</strong>sault gun battalion<br />
and would be forced to lean heavily on<br />
its artillery regiment.<br />
The Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade, the<br />
first to start for the battle front, w<strong>as</strong><br />
ordered to take the road from Ettelbruck<br />
to Martelange and t<strong>here</strong> deploy in sup-<br />
port of the 5th Parachute Division. 13 Its<br />
13 The history of the Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade<br />
is included in Die . Geschichte Des Panzerkorps<br />
Grossdeutschland, II, pp. 735ff. For other German<br />
units facing the XII Corps see MSS # B–023<br />
(Heilmann) ; B–067 (Schmidt); B–030 (Kniess) ;
534 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
mission, <strong>as</strong>signed before the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> began its counterattack, w<strong>as</strong><br />
changed on the evening of 21 December,<br />
and so w<strong>as</strong> its route, now menaced by<br />
the 80th Division advance on Ettelbruck.<br />
Trying to cross the Our River at the<br />
Roth bridges, the brigade ran into<br />
trouble. The bridges had been damaged<br />
by attack from the air, and traffic w<strong>as</strong><br />
backed up for miles on both sides of<br />
the river. Untrained drivers and mechan-<br />
ical failures further delayed the brigade<br />
<strong>as</strong> its columns entered the icy, narrow,<br />
twisting roads of the Ardennes, but by<br />
23 December the reconnaissance bat-<br />
talion, a rifle battalion in armored<br />
carriers, and two tank companies had<br />
reached Eschdorf and Heiderscheid.<br />
Gravely concerned by the rate of the<br />
American advance, the Seventh <strong>Army</strong><br />
commander sidetracked these troops<br />
short of the B<strong>as</strong>togne sector to restore<br />
the gap which w<strong>as</strong> opening between the<br />
5th Parachute Division and the 352d<br />
Volks Grenadier Division, and, <strong>as</strong> al-<br />
ready noted, the main body went in on<br />
on the 23d to stop the 80th Division at<br />
Heiderscheid. A part of the battalion of<br />
armored infantry marched south from<br />
Eschdorf and succeeded in getting cut<br />
off by the 26th Division night attack at<br />
Grevels-Bresil.<br />
The heavy losses suffered by the green<br />
brigade in its first hours of battle had<br />
a marked adverse impact on the morale<br />
of the entire command. Many times, in<br />
subsequent days of battle, higher com-<br />
manders would comment on the damage<br />
done the brigade by piecemeal commit-<br />
ment and defeat in its baptism of fire.<br />
The loss of the brigade commander,<br />
and the German Seventh <strong>Army</strong> B.T.O., Taetig-<br />
keitsbericht, 2. Halbjahr, 1944.<br />
Col. Hans-Joachim Kahler, further de-<br />
moralized the Fuehrer Grenadier. For<br />
successive days the command changed<br />
hands <strong>as</strong> new elements of the brigade<br />
arrived under more senior officers; this<br />
lack of leadership hardly w<strong>as</strong> calculated<br />
to restore the shaken confidence of<br />
young, inexperienced troops. Yet despite<br />
these early reverses in the counterattack<br />
role the young soldiers of the brigade<br />
would prove tough and tenacious on the<br />
defensive.<br />
On the morning of the 24th the<br />
Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade, still with-<br />
out artillery and with half of its tanks<br />
and infantry still e<strong>as</strong>t of the Our River,<br />
stood opposite the inner wings of the<br />
American 26th and 80th Divisions. The<br />
force of perhaps two rifle companies<br />
which had been cut off by the 26th<br />
Division south of Eschdorf w<strong>as</strong> known<br />
to be fighting its way out to the e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
The LXXXV Corps commander t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
fore decided to use his incoming rein-<br />
forcements-infantry of the 79th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division–in a counterattack<br />
to regain contact with the lost companies<br />
somew<strong>here</strong> around Eschdorf. This<br />
would be followed by a pivot to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, intended to strike the Americans<br />
in the flank at Heiderscheid. For this<br />
maneuver Col. Alois Weber, command-<br />
ing the 79th, had available one regiment,<br />
the 208th, and a single battalion of the<br />
212th. His division, like the Fuehrer<br />
Grenadier Brigade, had encountered the<br />
traffic jam at the Our River and while<br />
crossing on the Gentingen bridge had<br />
been further delayed by American<br />
fighter-bombers. The <strong>as</strong>sault gun bat-<br />
talion and tanks from the Fuehrer<br />
Grenadier were at Weber's disposal,<br />
but his artillery regiment w<strong>as</strong> missing,<br />
entangled someplace on the road e<strong>as</strong>t
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 535<br />
of the Our. By chance the 79th found<br />
an artillery battalion, belonging to the<br />
5th Parachute Division, which had been<br />
left behind when its prime movers broke<br />
down, and these guns were impressed to<br />
support the counterattack toward Hei-<br />
derscheid.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remained to the LXXXV Corps<br />
the 352d Volks Grenadier Division, by<br />
this time reduced to two battered regi-<br />
ments huddled north and e<strong>as</strong>t of Ettel-<br />
bruck. These regiments were needed<br />
w<strong>here</strong> they stood for not only did they<br />
guard the Ettelbruck bridgehead, cover-<br />
ing the flank of the Sauer crossings in<br />
the LXXXV Corps sector, but they also<br />
represented the only cohesive defense<br />
on the north bank of the river in the<br />
event that the American XII Corps de-<br />
cided to turn in that direction. The<br />
bulk of the 915th Regiment of the 352d,<br />
cut off by the American advance on<br />
23 December, could no longer be reck-<br />
oned with. (The major portion of these<br />
troops finally escaped through the thick<br />
woods, but would not reach the lines<br />
of the 352d until 25 December and then<br />
minus most of their equipment.) The<br />
fight to bring the American 80th Divi-<br />
sion to a halt south of the Sure, or at<br />
the river itself, would have to be waged<br />
by the half-strength 79th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division. The battleground, be it<br />
said, favored the defender so long <strong>as</strong> he<br />
retained sufficient strength to seal off<br />
all penetrations. Whether he could do so<br />
remained to be seen.<br />
General McBride continued the attack<br />
on 24 December with the 317th and<br />
3 19th, whose forward battalions had<br />
been engaged with the enemy all through<br />
the previous night. After the loss of the<br />
two battalions from the 3 18th to the 4th<br />
Armored Division, the 219th had simply<br />
byp<strong>as</strong>sed Ettelbruck, and the 3d Bat-<br />
talion of the 318th w<strong>as</strong> left to har<strong>as</strong>s<br />
the enemy t<strong>here</strong>in with artillery and<br />
mortar fire. The immediate division<br />
mission remained the same: to root<br />
out the enemy south of the Sure River<br />
and close in the north along the Sauer.<br />
The 319th, on the left, w<strong>as</strong> in posses-<br />
sion of the road net at Heiderscheid and<br />
had only a mile to cover before the regi-<br />
ment w<strong>as</strong> on the Sure. Indeed, two com-<br />
panies had spent the night within sight<br />
of the river at Heiderscheid although<br />
this w<strong>as</strong> in the zone of the 26th Division.<br />
The 317th had farther to go because the<br />
Sure looped away to the north in its<br />
sector. Furthermore the regiment w<strong>as</strong><br />
advancing with its right flank exposed<br />
to any riposte coming from e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
Sauer River. Advance northward would<br />
have to be made under the eyes of<br />
German observers atop two dominating<br />
hill m<strong>as</strong>ses, one close to the Sure at<br />
Ringel, the other rising on the west<br />
bank of the Sauer near the bridgehead<br />
village of Bourscheid, the initial <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembly area of the 79th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division. Fortunately for the Ameri-<br />
cans the 79th lacked the artillery to make<br />
full use of such commanding ground,<br />
but the German gunners proved to be<br />
very accurate.<br />
For the p<strong>as</strong>t twenty-four hours the<br />
317th Infantry had been attacking to<br />
reach Bourscheid and the high ground<br />
t<strong>here</strong>. Although the 2d Battalion lunged<br />
ahead <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Welscheid during the<br />
night, it failed to take the village and<br />
spent all the daylight hours of the 24th<br />
waiting for two companies to extricate<br />
themselves from the ridge on whose slope<br />
they lay pinned by German fire. (The<br />
regimental commander would later re-<br />
mark on the excellent musketry training
536 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
and first-rate small arms practice of this<br />
German unit.)<br />
The 1st Battalion, meanwhile, tried<br />
to hook around to the northe<strong>as</strong>t and<br />
gain entrance to Bourscheid along the<br />
main road. This advance brought the<br />
battalion onto open ground w<strong>here</strong><br />
the enemy <strong>as</strong>sault guns spotted farther<br />
north could get to work. Then the bat-<br />
talion came under flanking fire from the<br />
Germans around Kehmen, in the zone<br />
of the neighboring regiment. Mercilessly<br />
pounded from front and flank the bat-<br />
talion fell back for half a mile; its c<strong>as</strong>ual-<br />
ties numbered 197, mostly wounded. At<br />
this point each of the three battalions<br />
had taken a crack at punching a way<br />
through to Bourscheid. At the close of<br />
the 24th the 3 17th Infantry could report<br />
severe losses but no progress and the<br />
German tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns were<br />
raking the Americans w<strong>here</strong>ver they<br />
concentrated, even laying with accuracy<br />
on the battalion command posts.<br />
While the 317th w<strong>as</strong> being held in<br />
check by well-directed gunfire, the 3 19th<br />
attack collided with the enemy counter-<br />
attack aimed at Eschdorf and Heider-<br />
scheid. For this the 79th seems to have<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembled at le<strong>as</strong>t two battalions of<br />
infantry, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> tanks, <strong>as</strong>sault guns,<br />
and armored cars from the Fuehrer<br />
Grenadier Brigade. The 3 19th occupied<br />
a triangular position: at the apex the<br />
3d Battalion held Tadler, overlooking<br />
the Sure: to the right and rear the 1st<br />
Battalion had bivouacked in Kehmen<br />
on the Bourscheid road; the 2d Bat-<br />
talion (less its two companies near the<br />
Heiderscheidergrund crossing) w<strong>as</strong> sta-<br />
tioned <strong>as</strong> the left wing anchor at Heider-<br />
scheid. Colonel Taylor, the regimental<br />
commander, wished to bring his right<br />
forward to the river. In the dark, on<br />
the morning of the 24th, the 1st Bat-<br />
talion (Lt. Col. Hiram D. Ives)<br />
marched west out of Kehmen intending<br />
to turn north at the next crossroad, two<br />
miles away, and push for Ringel on<br />
the river.<br />
Daylight w<strong>as</strong> breaking when the head<br />
of the column came in sight of the cross-<br />
road. About that time two things hap-<br />
pened. A German detachment rushed<br />
into Kehmen, which the 1st Battalion<br />
had just left, while a German tank<br />
suddenly opened fire from a m<strong>as</strong>ked<br />
position near the crossroad and knocked<br />
out two Sherman tanks with the advance<br />
guard. The remaining American tanks<br />
h<strong>as</strong>tily reversed to the cover of a nearby<br />
draw and the infantry deployed along<br />
the road. About 0930 one of the attached<br />
self-propelled tank destroyers sneaked<br />
forward and gave the coup de grace to<br />
the German tank. New orders, however,<br />
left the battalion standing at the cross-<br />
road, for the 2d Battalion at Heider-<br />
scheid w<strong>as</strong> hard hit by the main force of<br />
the German counterattack and needed<br />
protection on the e<strong>as</strong>t. Ultimately fire<br />
from the 1st Battalion did contribute to<br />
halting an enemy attempt at encircling<br />
Heiderscheid.<br />
Colonel Bandy had held his 2d Bat-<br />
talion in Heiderscheid during the night<br />
of 23 December while awaiting the re-<br />
turn of the two companies that had been<br />
sent down to the river. An hour or so<br />
before daylight the first German shells<br />
came in. After ten minutes of this prepa-<br />
ration the enemy, on trucks, armored<br />
half-tracks and armored cars, suddenly<br />
appeared at the southwest corner of the<br />
village. This w<strong>as</strong> the main counterattack<br />
of the day for the 79th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division, launched <strong>as</strong> planned, from<br />
Eschdorf. The single American tank in
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 537<br />
the way w<strong>as</strong> surprised and put out of<br />
action, but strangely enough the German<br />
armored vehicles, mostly light flak tanks<br />
with 20-mm. guns, did not risk a precip-<br />
itate d<strong>as</strong>h into the village, contenting<br />
themselves with racing up and down the<br />
road which p<strong>as</strong>sed on the south, firing<br />
madly at the houses. The Americans, for<br />
their part, clustered at the windows and<br />
returned the fire with every weapon they<br />
could lay hand on.<br />
One tank destroyer w<strong>as</strong> in position to<br />
enfilade the road but by a curious chance<br />
it had been in the path of a bomb<br />
dropped by a stray German plane during<br />
the night and the firing mechanism w<strong>as</strong><br />
damaged. The tank destroyer com-<br />
mander tracked his gun on the p<strong>as</strong>sing<br />
targets, jumped up and down on the<br />
firing treadle, swore volubly, and banged<br />
the firing mechanism with a hammer but<br />
to no avail. Twice the German grena-<br />
diers got close enough to pitch grenades<br />
through windows. Finally one American<br />
tank worked its way around to get clear<br />
aim and did destroy four of the enemy<br />
armored vehicles. Eventually the enemy<br />
foot troops made their way into the<br />
streets. With this the forward observer<br />
for the 315th Field Artillery Battalion<br />
took over, calling for his 155-mm.<br />
howitzers to shell the village. For half<br />
an hour shells exploded, killing and<br />
lacerating the unprotected enemy. When<br />
the Germans retired they left 76 dead<br />
and 26 badly wounded: their Red Cross<br />
had removed many more during the<br />
fight.<br />
By midafternoon firing died down all<br />
along the 319th front. The h<strong>as</strong>tily organ-<br />
ized 79th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
counterattack had failed in its larger<br />
purpose although it had led Colonel<br />
Taylor to recall his advance battalion<br />
from its position of vantage close to the<br />
Sure. On the whole the 80th Division<br />
had been through a hard day’s fight, and<br />
McBride w<strong>as</strong> more than willing to accept<br />
the corps commander’s orders to hold up<br />
the attack until the following morning.<br />
Across the lines the Seventh <strong>Army</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> bringing in a new, provisional<br />
headquarters to <strong>as</strong>sume direction of the<br />
battle around B<strong>as</strong>togne. The boundary,<br />
to be effective on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day, ran<br />
between Eschdorf and Heiderscheid, ap-<br />
proximating that between the Ameri-<br />
can 26th and 80th Infantry Divisions.<br />
The Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade now<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed to the new Corps Rothkirch but<br />
would continue to oppose the 26th Di-<br />
vision just <strong>as</strong> the major part of its<br />
strength had done on 24 December. The<br />
LXXXV Corps w<strong>as</strong> left with the 79th<br />
and 352d. On Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
troops of the 352d left Ettelbruck,<br />
shelled out by high explosive and white<br />
phosphorus. The German line north and<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of the city <strong>here</strong>after would rest on<br />
the far bank of the Sauer.<br />
Kniess w<strong>as</strong> not yet ready to with-<br />
draw his right wing to the protection<br />
of the river barrier, nor would the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> commander permit it,<br />
for the high ground in the Bourscheid<br />
bridgehead could still be used to observe<br />
and interdict any crossing of the Sauer<br />
farther south and at the same time act<br />
<strong>as</strong> an anchor at the e<strong>as</strong>tern end of the<br />
Sure. Because the 79th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division still lacked much of its infan-<br />
try and nearly all of its heavy weapons,<br />
the corps commander ordered Colonel<br />
Weber to defend the bridgehead by con-<br />
centrating in the heavy woods around<br />
Kehmen and Welscheid. With the limit-<br />
ed rifle strength at his disposal. Weber<br />
w<strong>as</strong> able to man the Burden ridge, his
538 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
left flank thus adhering to the Sauer,<br />
but in the north the right flank of the<br />
79th consisted only of a thin outpost<br />
line extending to Ringel Hill and the<br />
Sure.<br />
Early on Christm<strong>as</strong> morning in the<br />
bitter cold the 80th Division returned<br />
to the attack, its main thrust aimed at<br />
Bourscheid. Colonel Fisher sent the 1st<br />
and 3d Battalions of the 317th Infantry<br />
toward Kehmen and Scheidel, hoping<br />
to open the road e<strong>as</strong>t into Bour-<br />
scheid. At Scheidel the attack surprised<br />
the enemy infantry; one platoon cap-<br />
tured the hamlet and a large number<br />
of prisoners. But when the two battalions<br />
turned north toward Kehmen the<br />
enemy (a battalion of the 266th Regi-<br />
ment) w<strong>as</strong> ready and waiting. Each <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault, made across open ground, w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
pelled by deadly fire from the village<br />
and the woods to the north. When Gen-<br />
eral McBride finally intervened to end<br />
the attack the <strong>as</strong>sault battalions had lost<br />
nearly two hundred officers and men.<br />
Kehmen once again had proved a hard<br />
nut to crack. 14<br />
While the 317th Infantry hit head on<br />
against the main position held by the<br />
79th Volks Grenadier Division, the 319th<br />
Infantry moved north into the gap on<br />
the German right flank. The 3d Bat-<br />
talion, which had withdrawn from its<br />
location close to the Sure in order to<br />
back up the other battalions in the fight-<br />
ing around Heiderscheid on the pre-<br />
vious day, simply marched back into<br />
Tadler. Since General McBride had or-<br />
dered the regiment to close up to the<br />
Sure but eschew any crossing attempt,<br />
14 Capt. Robert W. Smith, commanding Company<br />
K, w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC for bravery and leader-<br />
ship displayed in the fight at Kehmen.<br />
the battalion w<strong>as</strong> content to outpost<br />
along the river. From Tadler small<br />
groups of the enemy could be seen mov-<br />
ing about on Ringel Hill, farther to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. The 90th Field Artillery Battalion<br />
dropped a few shells into the village<br />
atop the hill; then the 2d Battalion oc-<br />
cupied the area with little trouble. The<br />
hill position seriously endangered the<br />
German bridgehead, but the 79th w<strong>as</strong><br />
too far understrength to mount any<br />
sizable counterattack on this flank.<br />
During the afternoon an American<br />
outpost saw a small German detachment<br />
marching in column of twos up a draw<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Ringel. The men at the outpost<br />
could not believe their eyes; they could<br />
only conclude that the approaching Ger-<br />
mans were coming to surrender. When<br />
challenged the little column kept on<br />
coming, until a light machine gun put<br />
an end to this “counterattack.” An hour<br />
before midnight more figures were seen<br />
approaching from the same direction.<br />
What had happened w<strong>as</strong> that the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> commander had inter-<br />
vened personally to order that Ringel<br />
Hill be retaken. Not only w<strong>as</strong> its posses-<br />
sion necessary to the defense of the 79th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division bridgehead<br />
but Brandenberger needed the serv-<br />
ices of an army engineer brigade that<br />
had been committed <strong>as</strong> infantry on the<br />
north bank of the Sure, in the sector<br />
overlooked by the hill. If this high<br />
ground could be retaken and some com-<br />
mand of this stretch of the Sure retained,<br />
the engineers could be employed else-<br />
w<strong>here</strong>.<br />
Since the fight with the 317th Infan-<br />
try had died down some hours earlier,<br />
Colonel Weber w<strong>as</strong> able to gather a sub-<br />
stantial force for the counterattack, but<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little ammunition for the few
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE<br />
guns supporting the 79th. The Amer-<br />
icans, on the other hand, were wired<br />
in to their division artillery and by now<br />
had a prearranged pattern of fire: four<br />
battalions answered the 2d Battalion<br />
call for help. A few of the attackers got<br />
close to Ringel, only to meet the whis-<br />
tling ricochet of armor-piercing shells<br />
fired by a single tank destroyer that<br />
rushed around the village like a man<br />
stamping out a lawn fire.<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Day witnessed the most ar-<br />
tillery activity of the entire division ad-<br />
vance; the guns were well forward, the<br />
infantry held good ground for obser-<br />
vation, and the fighting now surged at<br />
many points out of the woods and in-<br />
to the open.15 The total number of<br />
rounds fired by the 80th Division artillery<br />
w<strong>as</strong> large when <strong>as</strong>sessed against the ter-<br />
rain: 3,878 rounds and 142 missions. The<br />
80th Division advance ended the day<br />
after Christm<strong>as</strong>, with the 3 19th Infantry<br />
ch<strong>as</strong>ing the enemy out of the woods on<br />
the near bank of the Sure, the 317th dig-<br />
ging in opposite the Bourscheid bridge-<br />
head, and the lone battalion of the 3 18th<br />
exchanging fire with the Germans<br />
across the Sauer, in the course of which<br />
the commander of the 352d w<strong>as</strong> severe-<br />
ly wounded.<br />
General Patton w<strong>as</strong> in the process<br />
of strengthening the Third <strong>Army</strong> attack<br />
with more divisions. One of these, the<br />
35th Division, w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembling in the<br />
rear before joining the III Corps. Gen-<br />
eral McBride’s division, <strong>as</strong> a result, trans-<br />
ferred to the XII Corps on 26 December<br />
15 Pfc. J. O. Bird, of Company G, 319th Infantry,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC for gallantry in the Ringel<br />
action. When his company w<strong>as</strong> pinned down by<br />
an enemy machine gun, Private Bird went forward<br />
alone, under direct fire, and shot the crew; he<br />
accounted for fifteen Germans with his rifle.<br />
539<br />
without a change of ground. In the days<br />
that followed battalions rotated between<br />
the deep snow of the outpost lines and<br />
the relative warmth of shell-torn vil-<br />
lages, waiting while General Patton de-<br />
bated giving the XII Corps the go sign<br />
for an attack across the chill, swollen<br />
courses of the Sure and the Sauer. In<br />
the corresponding German headquar-<br />
ters other plans were under considera-<br />
tion, plans to use the Bourscheid bridge-<br />
head <strong>as</strong> a springboard from which to<br />
throw a spoiling attack against the flank<br />
of the American forces congregated<br />
around B<strong>as</strong>togne. But neither Branden-<br />
berger nor Kniess could scrape up the<br />
men, guns, and shells for such an am-<br />
bitious adventure. The 79th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division did what it could with<br />
what it had in almost daily counterat-<br />
tacks of small comp<strong>as</strong>s, only to be beaten<br />
off each time by the American howitzers.<br />
Ringel Hill continued <strong>as</strong> the chief ob-<br />
jective in these fruitless and costly at-<br />
tempts, and <strong>here</strong> the 79th made its l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
full-blown effort in a predawn attack<br />
on 30 December. The previous evening<br />
Company E, 319th Infantry, at that time<br />
forming the Ringel garrison, learned<br />
from prisoners taken on patrol that the<br />
attack would be made. The American<br />
division arranged for nine battalions of<br />
field artillery to give protective fire and<br />
the men in the garrison strengthened<br />
their outposts. The enemy made the <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault, <strong>as</strong> promised, but with such speed<br />
and skill <strong>as</strong> to enter the village before<br />
a single salvo could be fired. One group<br />
of Germans penetrated <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the bat-<br />
talion command post, but Pfc. W. J,<br />
McKenzie drove them off, killing the<br />
leaders, then taking sixteen prisoners.<br />
(McKenzie w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.)<br />
Their surprise tactics failed to save the
540 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
attackers. Concentration after concentra-<br />
tion poured in on the buildings that shel-<br />
tered the garrison troops, killing, maim-<br />
ing, and demoralizing the grenadiers.<br />
Those of the enemy who could not es-<br />
cape surrendered in groups to the first<br />
Americans they could find.<br />
When the 80th Division got its orders<br />
on 5 January to resume the attack, it<br />
could look back on a record of impor-<br />
tant accomplishment. It had contained<br />
and badly mauled two German divi-<br />
sions, had helped delay and cripple the<br />
Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade, on its way<br />
to enter the B<strong>as</strong>togne battle, and had<br />
advanced sixteen miles and er<strong>as</strong>ed the<br />
Ettelbruck bridgehead, so important in<br />
the communications system of the Sev-<br />
enth <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
The 26th Division Fight for a<br />
Bridgehead on the Sure<br />
24-27 December<br />
The 26th Division had not yet been<br />
able to push patrols through the woods<br />
to the Sure River when morning dawned<br />
on 24 December. Two companies of<br />
the 80th Division had crossed into the<br />
division zone and were waiting on the<br />
river near Heiderscheidergrund, but the<br />
foremost troops of the 26th Division<br />
were at Dellen, three and a half miles<br />
away, while the main force still w<strong>as</strong><br />
around Grosbous. Although small<br />
pockets of German riflemen fought stub-<br />
bornly in the woods t<strong>here</strong> seemed to<br />
be no cohesive, planned resistance by<br />
the enemy. <strong>To</strong> get the attack rolling<br />
and out of the woods, however, the<br />
Americans had to open the main road to<br />
the Sure. And to open the road they had<br />
to capture the town of Eschdorf.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> are many trails and byroads<br />
leading to the Sure but they become lost<br />
in deep, twisting ravines or run blindly<br />
through dense timber. All at this time<br />
were clogged by snow and ice. The road<br />
to Eschdorf follows a well-defined ridge<br />
and for much of its length gives a clear<br />
field of vision on both sides. Eschdorf,<br />
a town with perhaps two thousand peo-<br />
ple, is built on three hills which rise<br />
well above the surrounding countryside<br />
and give excellent observation over open<br />
ground for a half-mile to a mile in every<br />
direction. The <strong>as</strong>cent to the town is<br />
made across ridge folds. The main road<br />
coming in from the south turns away<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t to Heiderscheid and the Sauer cross-<br />
ing at Bourscheid, but other roads, three<br />
in all, continue north to the Sure River,<br />
one leading to the bridge at Heider-<br />
scheidergrund.<br />
The road net centering at Eschdorf<br />
w<strong>as</strong> very important in the German plans<br />
to hold the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> blocking posi-<br />
tion south of the Sure. Originally Bran-<br />
denberger hoped to use the town <strong>as</strong><br />
a concentration point for a counterat-<br />
tack by the Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade<br />
along the road to Martelange. The bri-<br />
gade, <strong>as</strong> recounted earlier, had started<br />
this move by piecemeal commitment<br />
while the main body still w<strong>as</strong> on the<br />
march to the front, but when the 26th<br />
Division banged into the Fuehrer Gren-<br />
adier advance guard southwest of Esch-<br />
dorf a part of the leading battalion<br />
w<strong>as</strong> cut off and the way to Martelange<br />
effectively barred. The staff of the<br />
LXXXV Corps t<strong>here</strong>fore drew new plans<br />
on the night of the 23d to conform with<br />
Brandenberger’s order that the Amer-<br />
ican attack must be checked south of<br />
the Sure. The idea w<strong>as</strong> that the Fuehrer<br />
Grenadier Brigade, on the west, and the<br />
79th Volks Grenadier Division, from the
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 541<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, should launch a concentric drive,<br />
pinching off the most forward units in<br />
the American advance. Although much<br />
of the heavy weapon strength of the bri-<br />
gade w<strong>as</strong> loaned to the 79th, the bri-<br />
gade itself w<strong>as</strong> expected to hold back<br />
the Americans south of Eschdorf, at the<br />
same time striking in strength e<strong>as</strong>t from<br />
that town to retake Heiderscheid. But<br />
whether the operation ordered for 24<br />
December fared well or ill, the Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong> commander w<strong>as</strong> adamant on one<br />
point: Eschdorf w<strong>as</strong> to be held.<br />
General Paul w<strong>as</strong> equally convinced<br />
of the importance attaching to the com-<br />
mand of Eschdorf and its radial roads.<br />
As early <strong>as</strong> the night of the 22d, when<br />
the III Corps optimistically prescribed<br />
the capture of Wiltz <strong>as</strong> the next step to<br />
be taken by the 26th Division, Paul or-<br />
dered that a t<strong>as</strong>k force be created to<br />
leapfrog ahead of the 104th Infantry,<br />
capture Eschdorf, and chisel a groove to<br />
the Sure. Unwilling to expend his divi-<br />
sion reserve, Paul took the 2d Battalion,<br />
328th Infantry, <strong>as</strong> the t<strong>as</strong>k force nu-<br />
cleus and turned it over to an officer with<br />
the division staff, Lt. Col. Paul Hamil-<br />
ton. A few tanks and tank destroyers<br />
were added, but through confusion in<br />
orders the engineer company supposed<br />
to be attached never joined the t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force.<br />
In the first hour of the 23d, T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Hamilton left Hostert in trucks.<br />
As the column turned north it found<br />
the 104th Infantry busy along the road-<br />
side with small groups of German in-<br />
fantry who were holding out in the<br />
woods. North of Grosbous two German<br />
tanks lay in wait just off the road, but<br />
were dispatched summarily by an <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault gun. The column dismounted<br />
about a mile and a half south of Esch-<br />
dorf, sent back the trucks, and put out<br />
pickets for the night. By this time Ger-<br />
mans had appeared in some numbers<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t and west of the t<strong>as</strong>k force and their<br />
tanks had opened fire, but the 104th<br />
w<strong>as</strong> coming up and by agreement w<strong>as</strong><br />
to cover Hamilton’s flanks.<br />
At daylight on the 24th scouts on the<br />
hills to the front reported much activity<br />
around Eschdorf, with vehicles d<strong>as</strong>hing<br />
in and out of the town. The Fuehrer<br />
Grenadier attack against the 80th<br />
Division garrison in Heiderscheid w<strong>as</strong><br />
in full swing, although hardly develop-<br />
ing according to plan. The road to Esch-<br />
dorf, now ahead of T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hamil-<br />
ton, rose and dipped to conform with<br />
the ridge folds reaching back to the<br />
hills on either side. The leading com-<br />
pany had just climbed to the crest of<br />
one of these wooded folds when a storm<br />
of bullet and tank fire raked into its<br />
flank, coming down the length of the<br />
main ridge. The second company at-<br />
tempted to swing wide and to the van: it<br />
too found the ridge a bullet conductor.<br />
About this time the rear of the column<br />
came under direct and rapid shellfire<br />
from a hill on the right. Boxed in on<br />
front and rear, T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hamilton<br />
spent most of the day trying to maneu-<br />
ver off the road and across the wooded<br />
nose ahead. The 81-mm. mortars got a<br />
real workout, churning the woods until<br />
they had fired four times their normal<br />
load of shells.<br />
<strong>To</strong>ward sundown help came in the<br />
air. P-47’s of the 379th Squadron<br />
(362d Fighter Group), out on their l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
mission of the day, swept low over the<br />
pine stands on the ridge, dropping frag-<br />
mentation bombs and strafing. For some<br />
fifty Germans, well and wounded, this<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the finishing touch; they came strag-
542 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
gling out of the woods, hands high.<br />
Now that bullet fire no longer shaved<br />
the ridge like a razor T<strong>as</strong>k Force Ham-<br />
ilton could move. It took the hamlet<br />
of Hierheck, w<strong>here</strong> the woods gave way<br />
to the open ground leading up to Esch-<br />
dorf, and then Hamilton gave orders<br />
to dig in for the night-orders which<br />
were countermanded almost at once by<br />
the division commander, who wanted<br />
Eschdorf that night.<br />
While T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hamilton w<strong>as</strong><br />
pinned down, General Paul had notified<br />
the III Corps that the 104th Infantry w<strong>as</strong><br />
taking over the t<strong>as</strong>k force. In early eve-<br />
ning the 104th Infantry received orders<br />
for the 1st Battalion (Maj. Leon D.<br />
Gladding) to take Eschdorf, while<br />
Hamilton went on to secure the Sure<br />
crossing. Later the division ordered the<br />
1st Battalion, 104th Infantry, to make<br />
the Sure crossing and Hamilton to take<br />
Eschdorf. Taking Eschdorf would not<br />
be an e<strong>as</strong>y job. When a small group<br />
of Hamilton’s men started forward to<br />
set up an observation post, they encoun-<br />
tered enemy fire before they had moved<br />
twenty-five yards from their foxholes.<br />
The Germans in Eschdorf were alert<br />
and waiting.<br />
Colonel Hamilton and Maj. Albert<br />
Friedman, the 2d Battalion commander,<br />
worked <strong>as</strong> rapidly <strong>as</strong> they could to de-<br />
vise a plan of attack and bring the t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force into <strong>as</strong>sault position, but it w<strong>as</strong><br />
midnight before all w<strong>as</strong> ready. Two<br />
companies, E and F, were to lead the<br />
attack, moving on either side of Esch-<br />
dorf with their inner flanks touching,<br />
but they were not to enter the village.<br />
Company G, with tank support, would<br />
follow the <strong>as</strong>sault companies and clear<br />
the village. This plan had been adopted<br />
in deference to the ground, since Esch-<br />
dorf rose well above the undulating<br />
ridges and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no higher ground<br />
to lend itself to a wider flanking move-<br />
ment.<br />
Forty-five minutes after midnight the<br />
two rifle companies started to climb the<br />
highest of the three hills on which the<br />
town stands, this being the south side.<br />
The night w<strong>as</strong> cold and clear, and a<br />
full moon w<strong>as</strong> out. As the attackers<br />
tramped forward, long, grotesque black<br />
shadows followed on the glittering<br />
snow. For the first few minutes all w<strong>as</strong><br />
quiet, ominously lovely and peaceful;<br />
then, <strong>as</strong> the first line reached the crest,<br />
all hell broke loose. The German rifle<br />
line lay along the reverse slope, the<br />
grenadiers in white capes and sheets<br />
blending unobtrusively with the pano-<br />
rama of snow. Burp guns and rifles<br />
cut loose at the splendid targets the<br />
Americans provided. In face of such a<br />
fusillade the attack wavered, then fell<br />
back. Three tanks, all that Hamilton<br />
had, churned to the fore through the<br />
snow but were checked by a little creek,<br />
extended by an antitank ditch, about<br />
300 yards from the nearest building.<br />
A hurried call by Hamilton, who<br />
wanted reinforcements to cover his<br />
flanks, brought no reply from the divi-<br />
sion headquarters except “Take Esch-<br />
dorf.” T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little choice but to<br />
continue with frontal tactics. At 0400 a<br />
second <strong>as</strong>sault started, this time with<br />
the tanks and Company G forming the<br />
center under orders to drive straight in-<br />
to Eschdorf without pause. Company G<br />
got only <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> the crest; the tanks<br />
went <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> before, and no farther.<br />
But the Germans facing the center were<br />
kept occupied long enough to start the<br />
wing companies moving. Firing <strong>as</strong> they<br />
went the two companies reached the vil-
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 543<br />
lage. Instead of marching p<strong>as</strong>t and<br />
around, the men closest to the buildings<br />
drifted inward, seeking the shadows and<br />
some kind of cover, dragging the two<br />
companies in with them.<br />
What then happened cannot be re-<br />
corded with any certainty. The story of<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Day inside Eschdorf w<strong>as</strong> one<br />
of confusion at the time and recrimina-<br />
tion later. Members of the 104th In-<br />
fantry subsequently claimed to have cap-<br />
tured Eschdorf and believed that no part<br />
of T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hamilton held on in the<br />
town. <strong>Of</strong>ficers and men of the t<strong>as</strong>k force,<br />
somewhat closer to the scene, have a dif-<br />
ferent story. 16 The men of the two com-<br />
panies that had reached Eschdorf on<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve were stranded t<strong>here</strong> in<br />
the houses while German armored ve-<br />
hicles jockeyed about, firing at doors and<br />
windows. In the meantime the bulk of<br />
the enemy infantry gat<strong>here</strong>d in the<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>tern corner to meet any attempt<br />
to reinforce the attackers. When day<br />
came the commander of Company E,<br />
Capt. Vaughn Swift, took his chances in<br />
the gauntlet of bullets and ran out to<br />
the American tanks. By some miracle<br />
he reached the Shermans alive and led<br />
them into Eschdorf. Two were knocked<br />
out t<strong>here</strong>, but not before they had<br />
quieted the enemy armored vehicles.<br />
(Captain Swift w<strong>as</strong> given the DSC.)<br />
16 The Eschdorf fight is well covered in the<br />
combat interviews held shortly after the event.<br />
The orders and counterorders given Hamilton are<br />
found in the 26th Division G–3 journal and the<br />
104th Infantry journal. The journal of the 104th<br />
records that Company F w<strong>as</strong> driven out of<br />
Eschdorf (at 0835 on 25 December) and seems to<br />
have been interpreted <strong>as</strong> meaning that none of<br />
Hamilton’s force w<strong>as</strong> in the town. However, no<br />
part of the 1st Battalion, 104th Infantry, w<strong>as</strong><br />
committed in this fight until after the air strike<br />
on the afternoon of 25 December.<br />
As the day went on the two company<br />
commanders tried to sort out their men<br />
and resume the drive to cut through to<br />
the roads entering Eschdorf from the<br />
north. Whether this w<strong>as</strong> accomplished<br />
remains a matter of debate. Finally, in<br />
the late afternoon, the division head-<br />
quarters responded to Hamilton’s urg-<br />
ing and instructed the 104th Infantry to<br />
send its 1st Battalion and envelop Esch-<br />
dorf. The instructions were followed.<br />
Company C entered the village an hour<br />
or so after daylight on 26 December<br />
and by 0800 reported Eschdorf clear of<br />
the enemy.<br />
Throughout Christm<strong>as</strong> Day corps and<br />
division artillery beat the northern ap-<br />
proaches to Eschdorf, hoping to isolate<br />
the uncertain dogfight within the town.<br />
As it turned out, the Fuehrer Grena-<br />
dier Brigade had no intention of inter-<br />
vening t<strong>here</strong> but w<strong>as</strong> slipping north<br />
through the woods and ravines, while<br />
a few rear guard detachments fought on<br />
to form a new bulwark to defend the<br />
Sure River line. As early <strong>as</strong> the after-<br />
noon of 24 December the 3d Battalion,<br />
104th Infantry (Lt. Col. Howard C. Del-<br />
lert) , had reached Heiderscheid, t<strong>here</strong><br />
secured guides from the 319th, and had<br />
gone on to relieve the two companies of<br />
the 319th on the river at Heider-<br />
scheidergrund. 17<br />
While the 104th put troops along the<br />
river, its sister regiment made a march<br />
of three and a half miles over rough<br />
17 T<strong>here</strong> seems to have been some initial con-<br />
fusion <strong>as</strong> to the exact status of the troops already<br />
in that village, for in one of the rare changes<br />
made in an official periodic report that of the<br />
III Corps w<strong>as</strong> amended to read that the 26th<br />
Division “relieved two companies of the 80th<br />
Division” in place of “liberated two companies of<br />
the 80th Division.”
544 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
country but against little opposition and<br />
by nightfall of the 24th w<strong>as</strong> near the<br />
bridge site at Bonnal. On the extreme<br />
left flank at Bilsdorf, Company C of the<br />
249th Engineer Combat Battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
on reconnaissance when it w<strong>as</strong> struck by<br />
a much larger enemy force deployed in<br />
the village. The company commander,<br />
Capt. A. J. Cissna, elected to stay<br />
behind and cover his men <strong>as</strong> they with-<br />
drew from Bilsdorf; he fought alone un-<br />
til he w<strong>as</strong> killed. Cissna w<strong>as</strong> awarded<br />
the DSC posthumously. The 1st Battal-<br />
ion of the 328th (Lt. Col. W. A.<br />
Callanan), aided by the 2d Battalion,<br />
101st Infantry, found a rear guard group<br />
of the Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade holed<br />
up in Arsdorf, near the division west<br />
boundary, and spent the night of the<br />
24th digging the grenadiers out of attics<br />
and cellars. By midmorning Arsdorf w<strong>as</strong><br />
in hand and the left flank of the 26th<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> fairly secure except for<br />
Bigonville, three miles northwest, which<br />
now p<strong>as</strong>sed into the division zone <strong>as</strong><br />
CCR, 4th Armored Division, left that<br />
village to play a new role on the western<br />
flank of the corps.<br />
But the main mission of the 26th Divi-<br />
sion, to make a crossing at the Sure<br />
River, had yet to be accomplished when<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Hamilton started the fight at<br />
Eschdorf on the night of 24 December.<br />
General Paul, beset by incessant urging<br />
from the III Corps commander, p<strong>as</strong>sed<br />
the word to his two forward regiments<br />
that the attack must get into high gear,<br />
then sent a message to General Millikin<br />
that he hoped to seize the Sure crossing<br />
before daylight on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day.<br />
Pitched battles at Eschdorf and Arsdorf<br />
so entangled the division that the idea of<br />
a general movement forward had to be<br />
abandoned, particularly when on Christ-<br />
m<strong>as</strong> Day an additional battalion had to<br />
be committed at both of these towns.<br />
Although troops of the two attacking<br />
regiments were within sight of the river<br />
on Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve they found that t<strong>here</strong><br />
would be no surprise crossing. In the<br />
zone of the 104th Infantry the enemy,<br />
alerted by the presence of the two companies<br />
of the 319th, had strengthened<br />
his position at the opposite end of the<br />
Heiderscheidergrund bridge and it w<strong>as</strong><br />
apparent that a crossing site would have<br />
to be sought elsew<strong>here</strong>. On the left the<br />
3d Battalion of the 328th Infantry (Lt.<br />
Col. Arthur C. Tillison) reached the<br />
bare hill above Bonnal on Christm<strong>as</strong><br />
morning, just in time to see the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
German half-track cross the bridge before<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> blown.<br />
The corps commander now rele<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
the 101st Infantry from reserve and ordered<br />
General Paul to “keep going” and<br />
get to Wiltz, four miles the other side<br />
of the Sure. Paul planned to relieve the<br />
328th with his reserve regiment, but<br />
while arrangements were being made,<br />
on the night of the 25th, word fl<strong>as</strong>hed<br />
back that a bridge had been captured<br />
and that the 3d Battalion w<strong>as</strong> crossing.<br />
This episode of the Bonnal bridge is an<br />
apt–and instructive–example of the<br />
“fog of war.” The bridge actually had<br />
been destroyed eight to ten hours earlier,<br />
but it w<strong>as</strong> nearly midnight before the<br />
328th Infantry w<strong>as</strong> able to <strong>as</strong>certain that<br />
none of its troops had got across the<br />
river. Bad news never comes singly. The<br />
104th Infantry had to report that the<br />
Germans had blown up one span of the<br />
bridge at Heiderscheidergrund.<br />
The Sure River is in itself not too<br />
difficult an obstacle, at its widest point<br />
no more than twenty-five yards across.<br />
The current is not swift, and t<strong>here</strong> are
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 545<br />
many places w<strong>here</strong> it is possible to wade<br />
across. (Plans actually were made for<br />
sending an <strong>as</strong>sault party through the<br />
bitter cold stream, then wrapping the<br />
troops in blankets and thawing them out<br />
on the far bank.) The problem is to get<br />
down to the river and to get up the<br />
steep cliffs to the north bank. So twisting<br />
and tortuous is the river course and so<br />
blind are its bends that great care must<br />
be exercised in choosing a crossing point<br />
lest one have to cross the river twice. The<br />
approaches to the river, the meanderings<br />
of the river bed, and the exits on the<br />
north bank combined t<strong>here</strong>fore to dic-<br />
tate w<strong>here</strong> the 26th Division might cross.<br />
Whether the enemy w<strong>as</strong> strong<br />
enough to dictate how the division had<br />
to cross remained to be seen. The lay of<br />
the ground gave three potential crossing<br />
sites in the 26th Division zone: from<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t to west, Heiderscheidergrund, Esch-<br />
sur-Sure, and Bonnal. All had stone arch<br />
bridges of solid construction–or did<br />
prior to 25 December 1944. Heider-<br />
scheidergrund normally would present<br />
the most attractive of the three crossings<br />
because it gave entrance to the main<br />
Wiltz road. But the fight for Eschdorf<br />
had slowed down the 104th Infantry and<br />
prevented a thoroughgoing exploitation<br />
of the 3 19th toehold at Heiderscheider-<br />
grund. Furthermore the enemy had first<br />
concentrated to defend this, the most<br />
obvious of the three crossings. What he<br />
w<strong>as</strong> set to do to defend Esch-sur-Sure and<br />
Bonnal remained to be tested.<br />
The fragmented commitment of the<br />
Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade had resulted<br />
in heavy losses and blunted the fighting<br />
edge of this “elite” unit. By the very<br />
nature of its dispersed and staggered<br />
commitment the brigade had succeeded<br />
in creating a picture of strength quite<br />
out of keeping with reality. The 1st Bat-<br />
talion of the brigade, for example, had<br />
first appeared in front of the west wing<br />
of the 26th Division headed southwest,<br />
then had been turned around, had<br />
bumped back across the front of the<br />
328th–fighting <strong>here</strong> and t<strong>here</strong> in the<br />
woods <strong>as</strong> it went–and then had taken<br />
a hand against the 104th. Furthermore<br />
the Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade w<strong>as</strong> an<br />
amorphous organization which accorded<br />
with none of the tables carried in the<br />
American handbook on German order of<br />
battle. Since its numbering and unit<br />
names fitted much of the description of<br />
the elder formation, the Grossdeutsch-<br />
land Panzer Division, the brigade had<br />
been first identified <strong>as</strong> the division. It<br />
would take much time and numerous<br />
prisoners before the 26th Division order<br />
of battle team could complete the true<br />
picture of the brigade.<br />
When the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> commander<br />
ordered the Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade<br />
to withdraw to the Sure on 25 December,<br />
he intended the defense to continue on<br />
the south bank of the river. But the<br />
brigade’s rifle regiment, much under-<br />
strength <strong>as</strong> the consequence of the rough<br />
handling received at Arsdorf, Eschdorf,<br />
and in the counterattack at Heider-<br />
scheid, could no longer provide the nec-<br />
essary infantry. The bulk of the brigade<br />
had apparently crossed to the north side<br />
of the river by the morning of 26 Decem-<br />
ber, forming a line–or what p<strong>as</strong>sed for<br />
a line–e<strong>as</strong>t and west of Esch-sur-Sure.<br />
The only German reserve in this sector<br />
w<strong>as</strong> the army engineer brigade at<br />
Nothum, a 2½-mile march north of the<br />
Bonnal crossing. But General Branden-<br />
berger w<strong>as</strong> loath to employ any of his<br />
small engineer complement in the firing<br />
line except under the direst of circum-
546 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
stances. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little artillery to de-<br />
fend the line of the Sure; most of the<br />
guns and Werfers which had good prime<br />
movers and could be hauled along the<br />
crowded roads west of the Our were at<br />
work around B<strong>as</strong>togne or firing in de-<br />
fense of the Bourscheid bridgehead. One<br />
advantage the defenders did have: good<br />
observation from the heights overlook-<br />
ing the separate crossing sites.<br />
The morning of 26 December dawned<br />
bright and clear with the promise of air<br />
support for the 26th Division at the river.<br />
On the left the 101st Infantry had re-<br />
lieved the 328th and stood ready to<br />
attempt the crossing. The 101st w<strong>as</strong><br />
fresh and its ranks were full. After its<br />
first effort to reach the piers of the stone<br />
bridge at Bonnal w<strong>as</strong> met by rifle fire,<br />
a patrol discovered a good site farther<br />
to the west w<strong>here</strong> a river loop curled to<br />
the American side. Engineer <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
craft reached the 3d Battalion (Lt. Col.<br />
James N. Peale) shortly before noon,<br />
but a rumor had circulated that the<br />
enemy w<strong>as</strong> lying in wait on the opposite<br />
bank and the troops showed some re-<br />
luctance to move. Col. Walter T. Scott,<br />
the regimental commander, took a single<br />
bodyguard and crossed the river in a<br />
rubber boat, returning without mishap,<br />
The battalion then crossed, the silence<br />
broken only by the sound of the paddles,<br />
an occ<strong>as</strong>ional hoarse-voiced command,<br />
and a few rifle shots. The 1st Battalion<br />
(Maj. Albert L. Gramm), closer to<br />
Bonnal, likewise made an uneventful<br />
crossing. The enemy, no more than a<br />
few stray pickets, did not loiter. Engi-<br />
neers started a Bailey bridge, using the<br />
supports of the stone bridge at Bonnal,<br />
while the two battalions, tired by their<br />
scramble up the steep banks, dug in<br />
along the edge of the bluffs. The few<br />
enemy planes that tried to strafe along<br />
the river were destroyed or driven off<br />
by alert fighter-bombers and the 390th<br />
Antiaircraft Automatic Weapons Battal-<br />
ion. Nor did a small German counter-<br />
attack during the evening have any<br />
effect.<br />
The eyes of the Fuehrer Grenadier<br />
Brigade were fixed on Heiderscheider-<br />
grund w<strong>here</strong> the German fighting ve-<br />
hicles and riflemen waited for the main<br />
American effort. Although one span of<br />
the stone bridge had been blown <strong>as</strong> a<br />
precautionary me<strong>as</strong>ure, the enemy threw<br />
a trestle over the gap, preserving the<br />
the bridge <strong>as</strong> a sally port to the south<br />
bank. Twice German tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns made a bid to recross and counter-<br />
attack the 104th Infantry. The first<br />
attempt w<strong>as</strong> stopped short of the bridge<br />
by rapid shellfire. The second w<strong>as</strong> more<br />
successful: four tanks and an <strong>as</strong>sault gun<br />
rammed across the bridge but were aban-<br />
doned by their crews when American<br />
guns and howitzers brought salvo after<br />
salvo of white phosphorus to sear the<br />
near bank. During the 26th, patrols<br />
operating in the 104th Infantry sector<br />
put their gl<strong>as</strong>ses on Esch-sur-Sure. They<br />
reported that t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no sign of the<br />
enemy in the village, but Colonel Palla-<br />
dino could not risk an immediate cross-<br />
ing on his left while the Germans<br />
opposite his right held a bridge and still<br />
seemed willing to carry the fight back<br />
to the American side of the river.<br />
The troops in the attenuated 101st<br />
bridgehead e<strong>as</strong>ily repulsed a minor<br />
counterattack on the morning of 27 De-<br />
cember. As yet t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> nothing to<br />
indicate an enemy shift to meet this<br />
threat to the Sure River position. By<br />
midmorning the Bailey bridge w<strong>as</strong> open<br />
and tanks and tank destroyers crossed to
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 547<br />
support the 3d Battalion <strong>as</strong> it climbed<br />
on up the bluffs to Liefrange. Since the<br />
two bridges at Esch-sur-Sure had been<br />
demolished, the commander of the 104th<br />
Infantry arranged for his left battalion<br />
to borrow the Bonnal Bailey. As the<br />
right battalion put on a demonstration<br />
with much firing at Heiderscheider-<br />
grund, the left crossed, then swung back<br />
toward Kaundorf <strong>as</strong> if to command the<br />
road climbing from Esch-sur-Sure. While<br />
this maneuver w<strong>as</strong> in process the engi-<br />
neers constructed a treadway bridge at<br />
Esch and tank destroyers were put across<br />
to reinforce Palladino’s battalion on the<br />
ESCH-SUR-SURE<br />
far bank. By the close of the day it could<br />
be said that the Sure bridgehead w<strong>as</strong><br />
firm and the way open to recapture<br />
Wiltz. 18<br />
The 4th Armored Division<br />
Reaches B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Day came and went leaving<br />
the 4th Armored Division toiling slowly<br />
toward B<strong>as</strong>togne. The left wing of the<br />
III Corps now conformed to the slow,<br />
18 The 26th Division fight on the far bank of<br />
the Sure is described in Chapter XXIV.
548 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
foot-slogging pace of the divisions on the<br />
right and in the center. Both CCA and<br />
CCB had an additional rifle battalion<br />
when the attack resumed on the 25th,<br />
for the 1st and 2d Battalions of the 318th<br />
Infantry had reported to General Gaffey<br />
late on Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve after a cold, miser-<br />
able, six-hour truck ride from the 80th<br />
Division sector. Both battalions, the 1st<br />
attached to CCA and the 2d to CCB,<br />
were considerably understrength after<br />
the bloody engagements at Ettelbruck.<br />
The 1st Battalion, whose officer losses<br />
had been very high, had a new com-<br />
mander and so did all of its companies.<br />
During the fight at Warnach a few<br />
tanks from CCA had tried to drive on to<br />
Tintange but had bogged down. Gen-<br />
eral Gaffey t<strong>here</strong>fore decided to employ<br />
a part of his infantry reinforcement with<br />
the general mission of attacking to reach<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne, and the more immediate job<br />
of taking. Tintange. After a freezing<br />
night bivouacked in the snow, Maj.<br />
George W. Connaughton’s 1st Battalion,<br />
3 18th, set off for a line of departure south<br />
of the village that w<strong>as</strong> shown on the<br />
map <strong>as</strong> a small creek.<br />
Gaffey had said that the battalion<br />
would have to fight for its line of de-<br />
parture. He w<strong>as</strong> right. The two <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
companies reached the creek only to dis-<br />
cover that they faced a deep gorge, with<br />
Germans arrayed to defend it. Somehow<br />
the infantry scrambled down and up<br />
again while their opponents pitched in<br />
hand grenades. Emerging south of the<br />
village the attackers came under con-<br />
tinuous rifle fire, but what stopped them<br />
cold w<strong>as</strong> a single large-caliber <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
gun whose shells burst w<strong>here</strong>ver the<br />
Americans turned. The support, Com-<br />
pany B (Capt. Reid McAllister), w<strong>as</strong><br />
given very special attention by the Ger-<br />
man gunners. Tired of taking losses<br />
w<strong>here</strong> it lay, the company <strong>as</strong>ked per-<br />
mission to take the burden of the <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
on its own shoulders. Two platoons<br />
advanced through the forward compa-<br />
nies and the enemy infantry inside the<br />
village immediately opened fire. In so<br />
doing the Germans gave away their<br />
locations to the third platoon, which had<br />
circled in from the e<strong>as</strong>t. Return fire<br />
coming in from the e<strong>as</strong>t momentarily<br />
silenced the garrison; galled by its losses<br />
Company B rushed the village, captured<br />
the maddening <strong>as</strong>sault gun <strong>as</strong> its crew<br />
sought to escape, and took 161 prisoners.<br />
This action must be credited to the in-<br />
fantry, but it should be added that eight<br />
fighter-bombers from the 377th Squad-<br />
ron had hit Tintange on call, bl<strong>as</strong>ting<br />
with bombs and rockets just before the<br />
riflemen moved in. During the day the<br />
5 1st Armored Infantry Battalion carried<br />
the advance on the west side of the<br />
Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Hol-<br />
lange, pausing <strong>here</strong> with night coming<br />
on and the enemy showing his first in-<br />
tention of making a stand. CCA now<br />
had cleared another-stretch of woods and<br />
villages flanking the B<strong>as</strong>togne highway-<br />
but the streets of B<strong>as</strong>togne still were<br />
seven miles away.<br />
The 2d Battalion, 318th Infantry (Lt.<br />
Col. Glenn H. Gardner), did its chore<br />
of woods clearing and village fighting on<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Day alongside the armored in-<br />
fantry and tanks of CCB. Chaumont,<br />
scene of the bitter action two days<br />
earlier, remained the immediate objec-<br />
tive. This time the enemy w<strong>as</strong> deeply<br />
dug in, all through the woods south of<br />
the village. While tanks from the 8th<br />
Tank Battalion edged around the woods<br />
firing indiscriminately into the pines, the<br />
foot troops routed out the German
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 549<br />
AMERICAN TROOPS IN TINTANGE J<strong>US</strong>T AFTER ITS CAPTURE<br />
infantry from holes and log-covered<br />
trenches w<strong>here</strong> they sought shelter from<br />
the tankers’ shells. This w<strong>as</strong> a slow, pre-<br />
carious business. Some of the enemy<br />
paratroopers could be persuaded that<br />
surrender w<strong>as</strong> the better part of valor,<br />
but many had to be finished off with<br />
grenades and even bayonets. In this<br />
manner the 2d Battalion worked<br />
through three successive wood lots, meet-<br />
ing strong rifle and automatic weapons<br />
fire in each. Here Sgt. Paul J. Wiedorfer<br />
made a lone charge against two German<br />
machine guns. He killed the crew serv-<br />
ing the first weapon and forced the crew<br />
of the second to surrender. (He w<strong>as</strong><br />
awarded the Medal of Honor.)<br />
Chaumont village w<strong>as</strong> less of a prob-<br />
lem. Prisoners had reported that a large<br />
number of panzers had come in during<br />
the night, but in fact t<strong>here</strong> were no tanks,<br />
except the derelict Shermans left on the<br />
23d. The American light tanks moved<br />
in with the infantry and by dark the<br />
village w<strong>as</strong> in American hands–most of<br />
the enemy had withdrawn farther north<br />
after the struggle in the woods. The 2d<br />
Battalion saw nearly a hundred of its<br />
men evacuated for bullet wounds, mostly<br />
suffered inside the woods. Both <strong>here</strong> and<br />
at Tintange the 5th Parachute troopers<br />
had been forced to rely on their small<br />
arms; the 318th <strong>as</strong> a result sustained<br />
more c<strong>as</strong>ualties from bullet fire than at<br />
any time since its frontal attack at the<br />
Moselle River in early .September.<br />
Artillery and large numbers of fighter-<br />
bombers belabored the 5th Parachute
550 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Division on 26 December. The advanc-<br />
ing Americans of the two combat com-<br />
mands and the attached infantry found<br />
that more and more of the enemy were<br />
willing to lay down their arms after<br />
honor had been satisfied by token re-<br />
sistance, but for each point w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
combination of American fighter-<br />
bombers, artillery, tanks, and infantry<br />
won quick surrender t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a cross-<br />
road, a patch of woods, or a tiny<br />
collection of houses to which a tough<br />
young officer and a few men clung<br />
fiercely. Bravery w<strong>as</strong> matched with brav-<br />
ery. Pfc. O. M. Laughlin of the 318th<br />
broke up one German position with<br />
grenades after he had been hit in the<br />
shoulder and could not use his rifle. (He<br />
received the DSC.) 19<br />
Spread across a wide front, CCA and<br />
CCB could maintain little contact: nor<br />
could the rifle battalions and tank-infan-<br />
try teams. Much of the American combat<br />
19 The battles on 26 December elicited numerous<br />
deeds of heroism. DSC’s were subsequently<br />
awarded to Capt. James H. Leach and 2d Lt. John<br />
A. Whitehill of the 4th Armored Division; Capt.<br />
Gabriel R. Martinez and Pfc. A. G. Means of the<br />
318th Infantry; and 2d Lt. Frederick Rau of the<br />
274th Armored Field Artillery Battalion.<br />
GERMAN PRISONERS CARRYING ONE OF THEIR WOUNDED IN A BLANKET
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE<br />
strength had to be diverted to screen<br />
the flanks of the individual detachments<br />
or to circle back to stamp out resistance<br />
flaring up unexpectedly in are<strong>as</strong> sup-<br />
posed to be free of the enemy. (CCA,<br />
for example, captured a battalion head-<br />
quarters and a large number of pris-<br />
oners in a fight at Hollange, south of<br />
Chaumont, which had been taken by<br />
CCB the day before.) Mines also made<br />
for delay. T<strong>here</strong> were more in the path<br />
of the advance than ever before, but they<br />
had been laid h<strong>as</strong>tily, were not well con-<br />
cealed, and often lacked fuzes. Again the<br />
most lethal and in numerous c<strong>as</strong>es the<br />
sole German weapons were the rifle,<br />
machine gun, or machine pistol. These<br />
served the enemy well, and gaps in the<br />
ranks of the attackers widened even <strong>as</strong><br />
the prisoner bag swelled. Captured para-<br />
troopers complained that they no longer<br />
had artillery support, that morale w<strong>as</strong><br />
cracking when friendly guns could not<br />
be seen or heard; nonetheless the dwin-<br />
dling strength of the 318th and the<br />
armored infantry battalions bore witness<br />
that the enemy still w<strong>as</strong> in a fighting<br />
mood.<br />
Despite all this the lines of the 101st<br />
Airborne Division were appreciably<br />
closer. By dark the 2d Battalion, 318th<br />
Infantry, after bitter battle and very<br />
heavy c<strong>as</strong>ualties, had reached the woods<br />
near Hompré, some 4,000 yards from the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter. Using green and<br />
red light signals, learned from prisoners<br />
in the p<strong>as</strong>t two days, 1st Lt. Walter P.<br />
Carr and a four-man patrol stole through<br />
the German lines, reaching the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
outposts at 0430. The return trip, with<br />
a situation map marked by the 101st Air-<br />
borne G–3, wrote finis to a daring and<br />
successful mission. But other Americans<br />
had beaten Carr to B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
551<br />
On Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve, when it w<strong>as</strong> appar-<br />
ent that no quick breakthrough could<br />
be expected on the Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne high-<br />
way, the 4th Armored Division com-<br />
mander could look to two possible means<br />
of levering the slowing attack into high<br />
gear. The two battalions of the 318th<br />
were ready to add more riflemen to what<br />
had become a slow-paced infantry bat-<br />
tle; perhaps this extra weight would tell<br />
and punch a hole through which the<br />
tanks of CCA and CCB could start<br />
rolling again. But General Gaffey w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
veteran and convinced armored officer,<br />
serving a commander whose name w<strong>as</strong><br />
everyw<strong>here</strong> attached to feats of speed<br />
and daring in mechanized warfare and<br />
whose doctrine w<strong>as</strong> simple: if the ground<br />
and the enemy combined to thwart the<br />
tanks in the area originally selected for<br />
attack, then find some other spot w<strong>here</strong><br />
the enemy might be less well situated<br />
to face a mechanized thrust.<br />
The command had caught a cat nap<br />
by 1100, fuel tanks were filled, com-<br />
manders were briefed, an artillery plane<br />
had oriented the gunners–and the drive<br />
began. The light tanks and a platoon of<br />
tank destroyers from the 704th Tank<br />
Destroyer Battalion led off, followed by<br />
paired teams of tank and armored in-<br />
fantry companies. The scattered German<br />
outposts, members of a replacement en-<br />
gineer battalion, dived for cover <strong>as</strong> the<br />
tanks raced along the road, then h<strong>as</strong>tily<br />
surrendered to the infantry following.<br />
Beyond Vaux-lez-Rosieres the column<br />
left the pavement and headed northe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
on a secondary road, hoping to find it<br />
ill-defended. Thus far the teams had<br />
leapfrogged, taking turns in dealing<br />
with the little villages away from the<br />
main route. About 1400 the advance<br />
guard w<strong>as</strong> checked at a small creek near
552 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Cobreville w<strong>here</strong> the only bridge had<br />
just been blown. Abrams called for the<br />
battalion bulldozer, always kept close to<br />
the headquarters tank in the column. It<br />
took an hour for the bulldozer to de-<br />
molish a stone wall and push the debris<br />
into the creek–then on went the column.<br />
CCR of the 4th Armored Division had<br />
just taken Bigonville on the division e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
flank, and w<strong>as</strong> counting its prisoners,<br />
waiting for orders, and making plans for<br />
feeding its troops a big Christm<strong>as</strong> dinner<br />
when Colonel Blanchard heard from the<br />
division commander. The order given<br />
w<strong>as</strong> brief: move to Neufchateau at once.<br />
Starting an hour after midnight, the<br />
combat command w<strong>as</strong> near Neufchâteau<br />
when it received other and more de-<br />
tailed orders–attack toward B<strong>as</strong>togne to<br />
<strong>as</strong>sist the advance of CCB (then south<br />
of Chaumont) and to protect the left<br />
flank of the division and corps.<br />
For this t<strong>as</strong>k CCR had the 37th Tank<br />
Battalion (Lt. Col. Creighton W.<br />
Abrams) , the 53d Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion (Lt. Col. George Jaques) ,<br />
the self-propelled 94th Armored Field<br />
Artillery Battalion, and a battery of 155-<br />
mm. howitzers from the 177th Field<br />
Artillery Battalion. Although CCR nor-<br />
mally w<strong>as</strong> not employed <strong>as</strong> an integral<br />
tactical unit in 4th Armored practice,<br />
the tank and rifle companies of the two<br />
battalions had teamed together in many<br />
a fight.<br />
Colonel Blanchard had selected his<br />
own route (to avoid blown bridges) and<br />
an <strong>as</strong>sembly area southwest of Bercheux<br />
village on the Neufchâteau-B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
road. Here the column closed shortly be-<br />
fore dawn on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day. Almost<br />
nothing w<strong>as</strong> known about the German<br />
strength or dispositions along the twelve-<br />
mile stretch of road that lay ahead. In-<br />
side of Bercheux w<strong>as</strong> a company of First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> engineers, which, <strong>as</strong> part of the<br />
VIII Corps barrier line, w<strong>as</strong> preparing<br />
to make a stand. Thus far, however, the<br />
Germans had shown little disposition to<br />
push much beyond Vaux-lez-Rosieres, a<br />
mile and a half farther up the road, from<br />
which the 28th Division headquarters<br />
had been driven on the night of the 22d.<br />
Remonville w<strong>as</strong> next. Perhaps some<br />
sixth sense warned that it w<strong>as</strong> full of<br />
Germans; maybe a spotter plane had<br />
seen movement t<strong>here</strong> or a frightened<br />
prisoner had talked. Whatever the rea-<br />
son, Remonville got the treatment. A<br />
company of Shermans lined up on the<br />
high ground outside the village with<br />
their guns trained on the houses. Four<br />
battalions of artillery, emplaced close<br />
enough to reach the target, opened rapid<br />
fire with high explosive and the tanks<br />
joined in. For five to ten minutes, long<br />
enough for the A Team to race to the<br />
village, shells rained down. In the streets<br />
the tank crews worked their machine<br />
guns until they were hot, while the in-<br />
fantry leaped from their half-tracks and<br />
sprinted from building to building. The<br />
German garrison, the 3d Battalion, 14th<br />
Parachute Regiment, had remained hid-<br />
den up to this point. Some now emerged<br />
-but it w<strong>as</strong> too late. Tank gunners and<br />
riflemen cut them down from every side.<br />
Hand grenades tossed through cellar<br />
windows and down cellar stairs quickly<br />
brought the recalcitrant–and living-to<br />
the surface. By dusk the job w<strong>as</strong> finished.<br />
CCR had taken 327 prisoners.<br />
The light tanks in the advance guard<br />
moved on, but only for a few hundred<br />
yards. A large crater pitting the road<br />
w<strong>here</strong> a small creek made a detour im-<br />
possible brought the column to a halt<br />
<strong>as</strong> the day ended. CCR had come abre<strong>as</strong>t
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 553<br />
of CCB, in fact w<strong>as</strong> fearful of using its<br />
artillery against any targets to the e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
Gaffey still expected CCB to make the<br />
breakthrough now that its west flank w<strong>as</strong><br />
protected. <strong>To</strong> this end General Taylor,<br />
impatient to reach his division in B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne, had joined General Dager’s com-<br />
mand post, bringing the first word Dager<br />
had that CCR had come up on his left.<br />
Even so the general mission for all of<br />
the 4th Armored Division remained the<br />
relief of the 101st Airborne.<br />
On Christm<strong>as</strong> night Colonel Blanch-<br />
ard and his officers huddled over a map<br />
which had just arrived by liaison plane.<br />
This map showed the American disposi-<br />
tion in the B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter, only six<br />
miles away, and a somewhat hypothetical<br />
scheme of the German order of battle<br />
<strong>as</strong> it faced in toward B<strong>as</strong>togne and out<br />
toward the 4th Armored. The red-<br />
penciled symbols representing the en-<br />
emy were most numerous and precise<br />
w<strong>here</strong> they faced north; by now the 101st<br />
had had ample opportunity to gauge the<br />
German strength and dispositions hem-<br />
ming it in. The red figures farther south<br />
were few and accompanied by question<br />
marks.<br />
B<strong>as</strong>ing it on this rather sketchy infor-<br />
mation, Blanchard gave his plan for<br />
attack on 26 December. This called for<br />
an advance through Remichampagne, a<br />
mile and a half away, and Clochimont.<br />
Then the combat command would turn<br />
northwest to Sibret, thus returning to the<br />
Neufchâteau-B<strong>as</strong>togne road. At Sibret,<br />
which air reconnaissance had reported<br />
to be full of troops, the main fight would<br />
apparently be made. Fighter-bomber<br />
support had been promised for the morn-<br />
ing of the 26th, and CCR had seen the<br />
sky full of American planes over B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne. The four firing batteries with<br />
CCR would displace from Juseret to new<br />
positions south of Cobreville, but be-<br />
cause the exact location of CCB w<strong>as</strong><br />
unknown the howitzers would not be<br />
laid on Remichampagne. Immediate<br />
targets would be two: a large block of<br />
woods west of Remichampagne, for<br />
which CCR could spare none of its lim-<br />
ited armored infantry; and the road<br />
from Morhet, leading e<strong>as</strong>t of the Neuf-<br />
château-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway, on which<br />
spotter planes had observed German<br />
tanks.<br />
When CCR started for Remicham-<br />
pagne on the morning of 26 December,<br />
the ground w<strong>as</strong> frozen, and tank going<br />
w<strong>as</strong> even better than it had been during<br />
the summer pursuit across France. The<br />
column had just gotten under way when<br />
suddenly a number of P–47’s appeared.<br />
Although the 362d Fighter Group w<strong>as</strong><br />
slated to give CCR a hand, these par-<br />
ticular planes, probably from the 362d,<br />
had not been called for. Bombing only<br />
a few hundred yards in front of the lead-<br />
ing tanks, the P–47’s shook all ide<strong>as</strong> of<br />
resistance out of the few Germans left<br />
in the village or the woods.<br />
Next w<strong>as</strong> Clochimont. CCR w<strong>as</strong> reach-<br />
ing the point w<strong>here</strong> a collision with the<br />
enemy main line of resistance could be<br />
expected or a strong counterattack be<br />
suffered. Carefully then, CCR deployed<br />
near Clochimont, moving its teams out<br />
to cover the flanks. Colonel Abrams dis-<br />
patched one tank company northward<br />
hoping to uncover the next enemy posi-<br />
tion or draw fire from Assenois, straight<br />
to the fore, or Sibret, the objective on<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne highway. It w<strong>as</strong> about 1500<br />
when these dispositions were completed.<br />
Orders called for the attack to be con-<br />
tinued toward Sibret, over to the north-<br />
west, but this town w<strong>as</strong> probably well
554 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
defended and German tanks, more likely<br />
than not, would be found guarding the<br />
main road. The 37th Tank Battalion had<br />
lost tanks <strong>here</strong> and t<strong>here</strong> along the way<br />
and had no more than twenty Shermans<br />
in operation. The 53d Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion, weak to begin with, now w<strong>as</strong><br />
short 230 men. The two battalion com-<br />
manders, Abrams and Jaques, stood by<br />
the road discussing the next move and<br />
watching what looked like hundreds of<br />
cargo planes flying overhead en route to<br />
drop supplies to the 101st when Abrams<br />
suggested that they try a d<strong>as</strong>h through<br />
Assenois straight into B<strong>as</strong>togne. It w<strong>as</strong><br />
true that Sibret w<strong>as</strong> next on the CCR<br />
itinerary, but it w<strong>as</strong> known to be strongly<br />
held and B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>as</strong> the 4th Armored<br />
Division objective. Jaques agreed.<br />
Abrams radioed Capt. William<br />
Dwight, the battalion S–3, to bring the<br />
C Team forward. It w<strong>as</strong> now about 1520.<br />
Another message, this time through the<br />
artillery liaison officer, gave the plan to<br />
the 94th Armored Field Artillery Battal-<br />
ion and <strong>as</strong>ked that the 101st Airborne be<br />
told that the armor w<strong>as</strong> coming in. The<br />
94th already w<strong>as</strong> registered to fire on<br />
Assenois, but t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little time in<br />
which to transmit data to the division<br />
artillery or arrange a fire plan. CCR<br />
alone among the combat commands had<br />
no telephone wire in. Continuous wave<br />
radio could not be counted on. Fre-<br />
quency modulation w<strong>as</strong> working fairly<br />
well, but all messages would have to be<br />
relayed. Despite these handicaps, in<br />
fifteen minutes three artillery battalions<br />
borrowed from CCB (the 22d, 253d, and<br />
776th) were tied in to make the shoot<br />
at Assenois when the call came.<br />
Colonel Abrams had entrusted Cap-<br />
tain Dwight with the shock troops (Com-<br />
pany C of the 37th Tank Battalion and<br />
Company C of the 53d Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion), telling him: “It’s the push!”<br />
By 1620 all w<strong>as</strong> ready and the team<br />
moved out, Shermans leading and half-<br />
tracks behind. Abrams stayed glued to<br />
his radio. At 1634 he checked with the<br />
94th Field Artillery Battalion and <strong>as</strong>ked<br />
if he could get the concentration on<br />
Assenois at a minute’s notice. Exactly<br />
one minute later the tank company com-<br />
mander, 1st Lt. Charles Boggess, called<br />
from the lead tank. Colonel Abrams<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed the word to the artillery, “Con-<br />
centration Number Nine, play it soft and<br />
sweet.” A TOT could hardly be expected<br />
with existing communications, but the<br />
thirteen batteries (an unlucky number<br />
for the enemy) sent ten volleys cr<strong>as</strong>hing<br />
onto Assenois.<br />
Eight antitank guns were sited around<br />
the village; <strong>here</strong> and t<strong>here</strong> a gun crew<br />
fired a wild shot before a shell bl<strong>as</strong>ted<br />
the piece or the furious fire of the Sher-<br />
man machine guns drove the cannoneers<br />
to their holes. At the dip in the road on<br />
the village edge Lieutenant Boggess<br />
called for the artillery to lift, then<br />
plunged ahead without waiting to see<br />
whether the 94th had his message. So<br />
close did the attack follow the artillery<br />
that not a hostile shot w<strong>as</strong> fired <strong>as</strong> the<br />
tanks raced into the streets. The center<br />
of the village w<strong>as</strong> almost <strong>as</strong> dark <strong>as</strong><br />
night, the sun shut out by smoke and<br />
dust. Two tanks made a wrong turn. One<br />
infantry half-track got into the tank col-<br />
umn; another w<strong>as</strong> knocked out when an<br />
American shell exploded nearby. The<br />
initial fire plan had called for the battery<br />
of 155’s to pl<strong>as</strong>ter the center of the town,<br />
and these shells still were coming in<br />
when the infantry half-tracks entered<br />
the streets. Far more vulnerable to the<br />
rain of shell fragments than the tankers,
THE III CORPS’ COUNTERATTACK TOWARD BASTOGNE 555<br />
the armored infantrymen leaped from<br />
their vehicles for the nearest doorway or<br />
wall. In the smoke and confusion the<br />
German garrison, a mixed group from<br />
the 5th Parachute and 26th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Divisions, poured out of the cel-<br />
lars. The ensuing shooting, clubbing,<br />
stabbing melee w<strong>as</strong> all that the armored<br />
infantry could handle and the C Team<br />
tanks rolled on to glory alone.<br />
The “relief column” heading out of<br />
Assenois for the B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter now<br />
consisted of the three Sherman tanks<br />
commanded by Lieutenant Boggess, the<br />
one half-track which had blundered into<br />
the tank column, and two more Sher-<br />
mans bringing up the rear. Boggess<br />
moved f<strong>as</strong>t, liberally spraying the tree<br />
line beside the highway with machine<br />
gun fire. But a 300-yard gap developed<br />
between the first three vehicles and the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t three, giving the enemy just time<br />
to throw a few Teller mines out on the<br />
road before the half-track appeared. The<br />
half-track rolled over the first mine and<br />
exploded. Captain Dwight then ran his<br />
tow tanks onto the shoulder, the crews<br />
removed the mines, and the tanks rushed<br />
on to catch up with Boggess. At 1650<br />
(the time is indelibly recorded in the<br />
4th Armored Division record) Boggess<br />
saw some engineers in friendly uniform<br />
preparing to <strong>as</strong>sault a pillbox near the<br />
highway. These were men from the<br />
326th Airborne Engineer Battalion-<br />
contact with the B<strong>as</strong>togne garrison had<br />
been made. Twenty minutes later Colo-<br />
nel Abrams (subsequently awarded the<br />
DSC for the action at Assenois) shook<br />
hands with General McAuliffe, who had<br />
come to the outpost line to welcome the<br />
relieving force.<br />
Colonel Jaques and the 53d Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion missed this dramatic<br />
moment; they were involved in a scram-<br />
bling fight for possession of Assenois-<br />
strictly an infantry battle now that the<br />
artillery no longer could intervene. This<br />
battle continued into the night, the 53d<br />
capturing some five hundred prisoners<br />
in and around the town. One American,<br />
S./Sgt. James R. Hendrix, took on the<br />
crews of the two 88-mm. guns with only<br />
his rifle, adding crews and guns to the<br />
bag in Assenois. (Hendrix w<strong>as</strong> awarded<br />
the Medal of Honor). More Germans<br />
filtered in along the dense woods which<br />
lined the e<strong>as</strong>t side of the B<strong>as</strong>togne road<br />
north of Assenois. Here Company A of<br />
the 53d w<strong>as</strong> put in to dig the Germans<br />
out, the company commander, Capt.<br />
Frank Kutak, directing the fight from<br />
his jeep for he had been wounded in<br />
both legs. (For bravery <strong>here</strong> and in other<br />
actions Kutak w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.)<br />
An hour or so after midnight enough<br />
of the enemy had been killed or cap-<br />
tured to give relatively safe p<strong>as</strong>sage along<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne road. Over 200 vehicles had<br />
been gat<strong>here</strong>d at Rossignol waiting for<br />
the road to open, and during the night<br />
the light tank company of the 37th Tank<br />
Battalion escorted forty trucks and sev-<br />
enty ambulances into B<strong>as</strong>togne.
CHAPTER XXII<br />
The Battle Before the Meuse<br />
The Meuse River Line<br />
Across the western edge of the Ar-<br />
dennes m<strong>as</strong>sif runs the Meuse River.<br />
This river, throughout history, h<strong>as</strong> been<br />
the natural line of resistance against an<br />
enemy advancing from e<strong>as</strong>t to west over<br />
the Belgian highlands. Actually, of<br />
course, the river channel changes direc-<br />
tion <strong>as</strong> it p<strong>as</strong>ses through Belgium, run-<br />
ning south to north between Ma<strong>as</strong>tricht<br />
and Liege, generally following an e<strong>as</strong>t-<br />
west line between Liege and Namur,<br />
and bending sharply at Namur to <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sume a south to north orientation. Al-<br />
though rather shallow, the Meuse aver-<br />
ages a width of 120 yards in its main<br />
course and is fed by so many streams that<br />
its current is unusually rapid, particu-<br />
larly in the winter se<strong>as</strong>on. T<strong>here</strong> are<br />
some fairly level approaches to the<br />
Meuse crossing sites; t<strong>here</strong> also are long<br />
stretches of steep banks bordering the<br />
channel, some of them are cliffs nearly<br />
three hundred feet high. As a comple-<br />
ment to the natural strength of this<br />
barrier the Belgian Government, before<br />
World War II, had limited the number<br />
of bridges spanning the Meuse. The<br />
events of 1940, however, demonstrated<br />
that modern armies could cross the<br />
Meuse speedily, either by surprise or by<br />
an overwhelming concentration of force.<br />
Within forty-eight hours of the launch-<br />
ing of the 1944 attack the Allied high<br />
command diagnosed the enemy intent <strong>as</strong><br />
that of driving to the Meuse in the vicin-<br />
ity of Liege. But t<strong>here</strong> could be no cer-<br />
tainty in the early ph<strong>as</strong>es of the German<br />
counteroffensive that such a diagnosis<br />
w<strong>as</strong> correct. It w<strong>as</strong> quite possible that<br />
the enemy might swerve south at the<br />
Meuse, following the historical inv<strong>as</strong>ion<br />
route p<strong>as</strong>t Sedan and on to Paris instead<br />
of turning north toward Liege and Ant-<br />
werp. General Middleton and the VIII<br />
Corps staff were concerned particularly<br />
with the possibility that the enemy plan<br />
might unfold into a thrust southward<br />
through the Meuse valley.<br />
Busy with plans and troop movements<br />
designed to bolster the threatened sector<br />
of the First <strong>Army</strong> front and harden the<br />
shoulders of the corridor through which<br />
the German divisions were crowding,<br />
SHAEF took its first steps to defend the<br />
line of the Meuse (with anything more<br />
than local security me<strong>as</strong>ures) on 18<br />
December. Late that day General Eisen-<br />
hower ordered the 17th Airborne and<br />
11th Armored Divisions, both training<br />
in the United Kingdom, to move to the<br />
Continent without delay. These two<br />
divisions were intended for use north<br />
and west of the Meuse, but they could<br />
not be expected for some days. From<br />
Reims, which w<strong>as</strong> designated <strong>as</strong> concen-<br />
tration area for the airborne division,<br />
the airborne could be moved to the west<br />
bank; the armored division w<strong>as</strong> slated
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E<br />
for use on the north bank. On the 20th,<br />
however, the 11th Armored Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
ordered to <strong>as</strong>semble north of Reims. At<br />
the same time SHAEF instructed the 6th<br />
Airborne Division (British) to move at<br />
once by sea to the 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group area<br />
<strong>as</strong> a preliminary to strengthening the de-<br />
fense on the north bank of the Meuse.<br />
In the meantime the 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> drawing uncomfortably<br />
close to the Huy-Dinant sector of the<br />
Meuse and the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> had<br />
ruptured the VIII Corps center. If the<br />
German forces continued to hold their<br />
pace westward the reinforcements from<br />
the United Kingdom would arrive at<br />
the Meuse too late. On 19 December,<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore, Field Marshal Montgomery on<br />
his own initiative started troops moving<br />
south from the 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group. The<br />
British commander had been in process<br />
of shifting the weight of his forces to the<br />
north in preparation for an offensive in<br />
the Rhineland when the Germans un-<br />
le<strong>as</strong>hed the attack in the Ardennes;<br />
indeed Montgomery’s southernmost<br />
command, the 30 Corps, already had<br />
started its advance parties moving north<br />
to the Canadian front. But at 1730 on<br />
19 December the 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group com-<br />
mander ordered General Horrocks to<br />
move his 30 Corps from Boxtel, Holland,<br />
into the area between Liège and Brus-<br />
sels and gave him the Guards Armoured<br />
Division and the 43d, 51st, and 53d<br />
Infantry Divisions, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> three ar-<br />
mored brigades.<br />
Because the situation late on the 19th<br />
“remained unple<strong>as</strong>antly vague,” to use<br />
Montgomery’s own phr<strong>as</strong>e, the British<br />
commander undertook emergency me<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ures to bar the Meuse crossings between<br />
Liège and Givet while the 30 Corps<br />
made its move. Reconnaissance attach-<br />
557<br />
ments h<strong>as</strong>tily organized from Special Air<br />
Services (British) and tank replacement<br />
center troops joined the American Com-<br />
munications Zone personnel to set up<br />
cover parties at the bridges between<br />
Liège and Givet. British armored cars<br />
patrolled the north bank of the river be-<br />
tween Liège and Namur. The 29th<br />
Armoured Brigade, then refitting<br />
with new tanks in western Belgium, w<strong>as</strong><br />
ordered to pick up its old tanks<br />
and hurry to defend the Namur-<br />
Dinant sector. Reports from the First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> at the close of the 19th<br />
led Montgomery to believe that t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> “little to prevent German armoured<br />
cars and reconnaissance elements [from]<br />
bounding the Meuse and advancing on<br />
Brussels.” That night British troops<br />
erected barriers and deployed roadblock<br />
detachments to protect the capital city,<br />
which had been liberated by the Guards<br />
Armoured Division on 3 September. 1<br />
The rapid deployment of the British<br />
screen between Liège and Givet de-<br />
cre<strong>as</strong>ed considerably the chance of a sur-<br />
prise crossing on this stretch of the<br />
Meuse, and the concentration of the 30<br />
Corps would be accomplished in time to<br />
provide a strong counterattack force in<br />
the event that the enemy did win a<br />
bridgehead. The 120-mile stretch of<br />
river from Givet (terminal point of the<br />
British line) to Verdun w<strong>as</strong> far less<br />
strongly defended than that in the north.<br />
It would take approximately a week to<br />
bring the 17th Airborne and 11th<br />
Armored Divisions from the United<br />
Kingdom into the line. Reinforcements<br />
moving from the Third and Ninth<br />
1 Montgomery, Normandy to the Baltic, p. 28off.;<br />
The Memoirs of Field-Marshal Montgomery, p.<br />
276. The latter touches on the Ardennes campaign<br />
only lightly.
558 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
BRITISH TANK PATROLLING THE ME<strong>US</strong>E AT NAMUR<br />
Armies were already tagged for stiffen-<br />
ing the First <strong>Army</strong> line of battle in the<br />
Ardennes. In these first critical days,<br />
then, the southern line of the Meuse<br />
would have to be guarded on a catch-<strong>as</strong>-<br />
catch-can b<strong>as</strong>is by troops brought up<br />
from the depots, supply dumps, adminis-<br />
trative installations, and headquarters<br />
in France and western Belgium. As late<br />
<strong>as</strong> the 22d t<strong>here</strong> were bridges with no<br />
organized defense whatever.<br />
The initial danger, or so it seemed,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> posed by saboteurs, parachutists, or<br />
small motorized detachments m<strong>as</strong>quer-<br />
ading <strong>as</strong> Americans or Belgian civilians.<br />
The bits of tactical intelligence accumu-<br />
lating <strong>as</strong> prisoners and documents came<br />
into the forward headquarters indicated<br />
clearly enough that the enemy had<br />
trained and committed special forces to<br />
seize the Meuse crossings. Parachutists<br />
captured behind the forward lines in the<br />
first hours of the battle told lurid tales<br />
of the plans to capture General Eisen-<br />
hower, blow up ammunition dumps, and<br />
destroy radio and telephone installations<br />
and POL pipelines. When a few bona<br />
fide Germans were captured complete<br />
with American uniforms, dog tags, and<br />
jeeps, the word spread through the battle<br />
area and raced from mouth to mouth<br />
back into France.<br />
Rumors, grossly elaborated from the<br />
few bits of fact, quickly jammed the
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E 559<br />
roads to Paris and Liège with hundreds<br />
of jeeps carrying enemy saboteurs or<br />
raiding parties in American uniform.<br />
Belgian or French café keepers who for<br />
weeks had been selling vin ordinaire,<br />
watered cognac, and sour champagne to<br />
the GI’s suddenly were elevated by<br />
rumor, suspicion, and hysteria to captaincies<br />
in the Waffen-SS. Ladies of no<br />
certain virtue who so far forgot themselves<br />
<strong>as</strong> to use some Teutonic phr<strong>as</strong>e<br />
picked up from their clients during the<br />
years of German occupation found themselves<br />
explaining this linguistic lapse to<br />
the military police or Counterintelligence<br />
Corps agents with far more earnestness<br />
than they had ever shown in<br />
justifying a moral lapse to agent or flic.<br />
The American officer who had the misfortune<br />
to appear on the heels of the<br />
most recent rumor in some headquarters<br />
w<strong>here</strong> he w<strong>as</strong> unknown stood a good<br />
chance of being welcomed with a cocked<br />
pistol leveled at his belt buckle. Jeep<br />
drivers who had forgotten their grade<br />
school geography quickly brushed up on<br />
the list of the forty-eight state capitals<br />
after having been stopped six or seven<br />
times by guards who thrust the muzzle of<br />
an M1 into the driver’s seat with a gruff<br />
demand for a quick identification of the<br />
capital of Alabama or Oregon. Field<br />
grade officers tried once to “rank” their<br />
way p<strong>as</strong>t a barricade, then resigned<br />
themselves to singing the first bars of<br />
“Mairzy Doats” for the edification of an<br />
adamant young private. And the heavily<br />
wrapped, pregnant farm wife who<br />
wished to cross any bridge found her<br />
delicate condition a cause of considerable<br />
embarr<strong>as</strong>sment both to herself and the<br />
suspicious bridge guards. 2<br />
2 For a Belgian view of the German offensive,<br />
see Paul Levy, Les Heures Rouges des Ardennes<br />
In the first days of the German ad-<br />
vance, security me<strong>as</strong>ures along the Meuse<br />
had been handled by the commanders<br />
of installations in the army rear are<strong>as</strong>.<br />
By the 20th this responsibility, particu-<br />
larly along the Meuse south of Givet,<br />
had been largely handed over to the<br />
Communications Zone and its com-<br />
mander, Lt. Gen. John C. H. Lee.<br />
General Lee’s responsibility of course<br />
reached far west of the Meuse. Guards<br />
had to be provided for the great supply<br />
dumps and headquarters cities, so also<br />
for rail lines, pipelines, supply roads, and<br />
the French telephone and telegraph sys-<br />
tem. Far to the west in Normandy supply<br />
troops went on the alert against a pos-<br />
sible raid by the German garrisons of the<br />
Channel Islands. In Paris, the GI’s<br />
Mecca, soldiers on leave were rounded<br />
up and started back to their units; those<br />
who remained in the City of Light found<br />
night life dr<strong>as</strong>tically curtailed by a rig-<br />
idly enforced curfew.<br />
Four engineer general service regi-<br />
ments could be <strong>as</strong>sembled for the Meuse<br />
line but would require some time to<br />
make the move. The commander of the<br />
Oise Intermediate Section of the Com-<br />
munications Zone, Brig. Gen. Charles O.<br />
Thr<strong>as</strong>her, had two locally available<br />
engineer units, the 354th and 1313th<br />
Engineer General Service Regiments,<br />
and these were organized <strong>as</strong> T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Thr<strong>as</strong>her on 20 December, beginning at<br />
once the work of preparing the Meuse<br />
rail and road bridges for demolition.<br />
Shortly afterward General Thr<strong>as</strong>her w<strong>as</strong><br />
authorized to blow these bridges if their<br />
(Bruxelles, 1946). It may be added that not a<br />
single act of sabotage at the Meuse crossings<br />
w<strong>as</strong> reported during the entire Ardennes campaign.<br />
Headquarters Advance Section, G–3, <strong>History</strong> of<br />
Operations: December 1943–1 July 1945.
560 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
capture appeared imminent. 3 Earlier<br />
this decision had rested with the tactical<br />
commands. One can only speculate <strong>as</strong> to<br />
what would have happened if a German<br />
armored column had kept to schedule<br />
and reached one of the important bridges<br />
before the bridge guards received au-<br />
thority to destroy the span.<br />
On 22 and 23 December, the 342d,<br />
392d, 366th, and 1308th Engineer Regi-<br />
ments took up positions along the Meuse,<br />
reinforced by a field artillery battalion,<br />
a regimental antitank company, and six<br />
French light infantry battalions provided<br />
by the military governor of Metz. These<br />
recently organized French troops were<br />
poorly equipped with a motley collection<br />
of small arms and a few trucks but they<br />
proved very useful in screening the<br />
military and civilian traffic along the<br />
roads leading to the Meuse, both e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
and west of the river. All of these troops<br />
and the responsibility for the sector<br />
Givet to Verdun were handed over to the<br />
VIII Corps on the 23d by orders of the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> commander, who by now<br />
had command on the south side of the<br />
Bulge.<br />
Even at this late date Middleton and<br />
Patton had some apprehension that the<br />
enemy columns might make a left wheel<br />
on the e<strong>as</strong>t or west bank of the Meuse<br />
and drive for Sedan. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
definition of the VIII Corps rear bound-<br />
ary; <strong>as</strong> the corps commander saw his<br />
responsibility, “a v<strong>as</strong>t area w<strong>as</strong> in-<br />
volved.” Not only were the corps west<br />
flank and rear open to a German turning<br />
3 The more general impact of the Ardennes on<br />
the American supply b<strong>as</strong>es and logistical system<br />
is treated in Roland G. Ruppenthal, Logistical<br />
Support of the Armies, UNITED STATES ARMY<br />
IN WORLD WAR II (W<strong>as</strong>hington, 1959). vol. II,<br />
pp. 181–87.<br />
movement but the main corps supply<br />
line, over which Middleton’s troops were<br />
being re-equipped, could be cut by raids<br />
directed against the Semois and Chiers<br />
Rivers, e<strong>as</strong>tern tributaries of the Meuse.<br />
Corps engineers were stationed at cross-<br />
ings <strong>as</strong> far west <strong>as</strong> Bouillon, and the<br />
Semois bridges west of Bouillon that had<br />
not been destroyed by the Germans<br />
during the September retreat were<br />
blown.<br />
The enemy did not turn against the<br />
VIII Corps e<strong>as</strong>t-west line, and the added<br />
burden of defending the Meuse between<br />
Givet and Semois, accorded Middleton<br />
on the 23d, rested more lightly when<br />
a part of the 11th Armored Division<br />
reached the west bank on the following<br />
day. This division, moving by forced<br />
marches from Normandy, closed on the<br />
25th; its commander, Brig. Gen. Charles<br />
S. Kilburn, took charge of all troops in<br />
the sector. The 17th Airborne Division,<br />
ordered from the United Kingdom at<br />
the same time <strong>as</strong> the 11th Armored, w<strong>as</strong><br />
delayed by bad weather which grounded<br />
its carrier planes. It finally closed at<br />
Charleville on 27 December, by which<br />
date the threat south of Givet had faded.<br />
The German panzer forces, had actu-<br />
ally aimed at crossing the Meuse be-<br />
tween Givet and Liège. Montgomery<br />
had reacted promptly to the danger<br />
posed by the onrushing 1st SS Panzer<br />
Division, but with his 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
caught off balance in the middle of its<br />
shift from south to north the plans and<br />
orders of the 19th could be implemented<br />
but slowly and in sketchy form. The<br />
American Communications Zone person-<br />
nel and the few British troops who took<br />
over the bridges were hardly enough to<br />
prepare demolitions, screen the traffic<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sing back and forth over the river in
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E 561<br />
the large bridgehead cities, and main-<br />
tain patrols, much less make an adequate<br />
defense against any crossing attempt in<br />
force.<br />
As of noon, 21 December, Brig. Gen.<br />
Ewart C. Plank reported that the vital<br />
crossings at Liège, Huy, Namur, and<br />
Givet were guarded only by the 29th<br />
Infantry (a separate regiment <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
to line of communications duty), two<br />
antiaircraft gun battalions, two antitank<br />
guns, four British scout cars, and a Brit-<br />
ish reconnaissance force of 300 men. The<br />
great bridgehead city of Liège had <strong>as</strong><br />
crossing guards only two rifle companies<br />
and two cannon company platoons.<br />
The bridges at Liège and other<br />
nearby points presented a special prob-<br />
lem. The V-bomb barrage directed into<br />
the area and German bombing planes<br />
made any installation of demolition<br />
charges on the bridge structures a haz-<br />
ardous business. Fearful that these im-<br />
portant spans would be prematurely<br />
destroyed by sympathetic explosion, the<br />
engineers could do no more than collect<br />
explosives and detonating devices in the<br />
vicinity of, but not on, the bridges in<br />
question.<br />
Although the crossings north of the<br />
bend in the Meuse still were weakly held<br />
on the 21st, the danger of a successful<br />
enemy penetration beyond the river had<br />
lessened. The movement of the 30 Corps,<br />
begun late on the 19th, w<strong>as</strong> not designed<br />
to erect a linear defense for every yard<br />
of the Meuse line but instead w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
first ph<strong>as</strong>e of Field Marshal Montgom-<br />
ery’s plan to create a counterattack force<br />
capable of dealing with any German<br />
columns which might reach and cross the<br />
river. By the afternoon of the 20th the<br />
British 43d Division and an attached<br />
tank brigade were west of Ma<strong>as</strong>tricht,<br />
poised to roll up the flank of any pene-<br />
tration across the Meuse.<br />
Next day the new disposition of the<br />
30 Corps w<strong>as</strong> completed. The 29th Ar-<br />
moured Brigade had returned to its<br />
battle-worn tanks and armored cars and<br />
w<strong>as</strong> established along the river between<br />
Namur and Givet. The 2d Household<br />
Cavalry Regiment, already on the river<br />
line for the p<strong>as</strong>t twenty-four hours,<br />
crossed the Meuse and pushed reconnais-<br />
sance <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Marche and Rochefort,<br />
meeting American patrols but no enemy.<br />
By the close of the day, General Horrocks<br />
could decide and did that now it w<strong>as</strong><br />
possible to hold the enemy at the Meuse<br />
line. The British responsibility, be it<br />
remembered, extended only <strong>as</strong> far south<br />
<strong>as</strong> Givet and did not include the actual<br />
defense of the bridges at Liège.<br />
On the night of 23 December a jeep<br />
load of Germans dressed <strong>as</strong> Americans<br />
appeared at Dinant, one of the few<br />
actual materializations of the oft-<br />
rumored saboteur parties. The jeep and<br />
its crew were captured by a British post.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> a little late for such tactics. By<br />
this time each of the main crossings–<br />
Givet, Dinant, and Namur–w<strong>as</strong> guarded<br />
by an armored regiment and a rifle<br />
company, and it is a fair <strong>as</strong>sumption that<br />
the opportunity for a German coup de<br />
main in the British-held sector w<strong>as</strong> gone<br />
by the 23d. 4 In the VIII Corps sector<br />
south of Givet the possibility of a sur-<br />
prise stroke still existed on this date, for<br />
t<strong>here</strong> remained a number of weak links<br />
in the Meuse chain, but the odds were<br />
incre<strong>as</strong>ing that the defender could at<br />
4 On 23 December Montgomery ordered all<br />
demolition charges removed from the bridges in<br />
the British sector. SHAEF SGS 38 ½ Germany,<br />
German Counter <strong>Of</strong>fensive, vol. I.
562<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t enforce delay at the Meuse. T<strong>here</strong><br />
remained, of course, the possibility that<br />
German armor might reach the Meuse<br />
somew<strong>here</strong> along its length in sufficient<br />
strength to gain by force what no longer<br />
could be won e<strong>as</strong>ily by stealth or surprise.<br />
The Meuse Seems Within Reach<br />
By Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve the German coun-<br />
teroffensive showed signs of losing co-<br />
hesion. The outlines of the over-all<br />
strategic plan still were discernible, but<br />
the higher field commands had begun<br />
to extemporize: in a word the German<br />
armies had commenced to “react” to the<br />
moves made by the enemy or in supposi-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
REFUGEES AT THE DINANT BRIDGE<br />
tion of what those moves might be. True,<br />
some German troops were very close to<br />
the Meuse and the advance to the west<br />
still had considerable momentum, but<br />
the initiative w<strong>as</strong> gradually slipping<br />
from German fingers and could not be<br />
regained unless the German armies held<br />
the Marche plateau <strong>as</strong> a wider b<strong>as</strong>e for<br />
the final drive to and over the Meuse.<br />
A résumé of decisions made in the<br />
higher German headquarters between<br />
22 December and the night of the 24th<br />
will show what w<strong>as</strong> happening. On the<br />
22d OB WEST prepared for Jodl an in-<br />
telligence appreciation which said that a<br />
major Allied counterattack from the<br />
north and south by reserves from the
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E 563<br />
U.S. Third and Seventh Armies w<strong>as</strong> un-<br />
likely before 1 January, and that a<br />
“limited” intervention against the flanks<br />
of the Bulge probably could not be<br />
attempted before 28 December. OB<br />
WEST did recognize that the Allies<br />
might <strong>as</strong>semble a strong force northwest<br />
of the Meuse and <strong>as</strong>sumed that they<br />
would be able to defend the Meuse in<br />
considerable force by 30 December. It<br />
appeared from this analysis that time<br />
still w<strong>as</strong> on the side of the German<br />
armies, time to interject armor from the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> into the columns<br />
driving for the Meuse and to give the<br />
depth to the forces in the van which<br />
Rundstedt now regarded <strong>as</strong> absolutely<br />
essential. On the 23d a report that the<br />
advance guard of the 2d Panzer Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> only nine kilometers from the Meuse<br />
fl<strong>as</strong>hed to Model, Rundstedt–and Hitler.<br />
MARCHE<br />
The Fuehrer replied with congratula-<br />
tions and, more to the point, rele<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
the 9th Panzer and 15th Panzer Grena-<br />
dier Divisions for free use by OB WEST.<br />
That same evening Model phoned Rund-<br />
stedt to tell of a strong American<br />
counterattack forming to relieve B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne which must be expected to strike<br />
on 24 December; he, Model, would have<br />
to retain a kampfgruppe of the 15th<br />
Panzer Grenadier for the expanding<br />
battle at B<strong>as</strong>togne, but the remainder of<br />
this division and the new 9th Panzer<br />
would be rushed westward to <strong>as</strong>sist the<br />
2d Panzer.<br />
On the morning of the 24th a note of<br />
urgency appeared in the orders coming<br />
out of Model’s command post: the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> must take B<strong>as</strong>togne at once<br />
and “lance this boil” in the southern<br />
flank. For this purpose Manteuffel would
564 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
retain a kampfgruppe of the 9th Panzer<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne <strong>as</strong> a link with the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong>, now hard pressed by the<br />
American counterattack from the south.<br />
The sense of urgency heightened <strong>as</strong> the<br />
day wore on-it can almost be plotted<br />
like a fever chart in the exchanges be-<br />
tween Rundstedt and Model: Rundstedt<br />
demanding that the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
get its armored divisions forward and<br />
alongside Manteuffel’s spearhead before<br />
the Allies can counterattack from both<br />
south and north; Rundstedt ordering<br />
that the Allied forces be destroyed e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the Meuse before they can organize a<br />
major countereffort; Model telling<br />
Rundstedt that the 2d Panzer h<strong>as</strong> run<br />
short of motor fuel and that he h<strong>as</strong><br />
ordered the advance guard to march for<br />
the Meuse on foot. (One h<strong>as</strong> the impres-<br />
sion–it can never be verified–that <strong>as</strong><br />
tension mounted Model commenced to<br />
turn to the older and more experienced<br />
field marshal for moral support.)<br />
General Manteuffel faced a military<br />
and political dilemma <strong>as</strong> day drew to a<br />
close on 24 December. Janus-like, his<br />
Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> faced toward the<br />
Marche plateau and the road to Dinant<br />
and toward B<strong>as</strong>togne. Manteuffel later<br />
would say that he saw no opportunity<br />
for a successful battle west of the Meuse<br />
(although he still hoped for military<br />
success e<strong>as</strong>t of the river) , but the decision<br />
<strong>as</strong> to which direction the Fifth Panzer<br />
would throw its weight obviously had<br />
to be made by Hitler himself. This ap-<br />
peal to the highest German authority<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made through various channels by<br />
Manteuffel and his chief of staff,<br />
Wagener, on the 24th and 25th. Hitler’s<br />
order, <strong>as</strong> relayed to the Fifth Panzer<br />
headquarters by Jodl early on the 25th,<br />
told Manteuffel to put all available forces<br />
into the battle for control of the Marche<br />
plateau. Manteuffel could hardly disen-<br />
gage from B<strong>as</strong>togne and turn the fight<br />
over to the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> (indeed, this<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not the Fuehrer’s intention), but<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> crystal Clear that the 2d Panzer<br />
Division advance guard had to be rein-<br />
forced and the narrow wedge it had<br />
driven toward the Meuse had to be ex-<br />
panded into a pile driver blow to cross<br />
that river. 5<br />
Manteuffel’s immediate tactical prob-<br />
lem had four parts: the road to the<br />
isolated 2d Panzer advance guard must<br />
be reopened, 6 both for tank fuel and<br />
reinforcements; the northern flank of<br />
the salient reaching toward Dinant<br />
would have to be covered at once and in<br />
considerable strength; in the southwest<br />
w<strong>here</strong> signs of an American concentra-<br />
tion were appearing the southern side of<br />
the corridor toward the Meuse must be<br />
barricaded, perhaps <strong>as</strong> far back <strong>as</strong> B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne; finally, the <strong>as</strong>sault front in the<br />
center required greater width and depth<br />
on the Marche plateau. The solution of<br />
this problem demanded more strength<br />
than the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, with its<br />
tail caught in the crack at B<strong>as</strong>togne,<br />
could am<strong>as</strong>s.<br />
Manteuffel had been promised at le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
three more divisions, Jodl had <strong>as</strong>sured<br />
him that the II SS Panzer Corps w<strong>as</strong><br />
being rushed forward by the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> to take over the fight on<br />
his right wing e<strong>as</strong>t of the Ourthe River,<br />
and he had re<strong>as</strong>on to expect that the<br />
9th Panzer Division would arrive in time<br />
to take part in the attack planned for<br />
5 Manteuffel’s recollections of this period are<br />
very vivid: see MS # B-151a.<br />
6 See Chapter XVIII for the earlier story of the<br />
2d Panzer advance guard.
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E 565<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Day. For this attack, pri-<br />
marily designed to reach the “extended<br />
index finger” (<strong>as</strong> one German report<br />
calls it) formed by the advance detach-<br />
ment of the 2d Panzer in the woods<br />
around Foy–Notre Dame, Manteuffel<br />
counted on a drive by the bulk of the<br />
2d Panzer to reach its cut-off troops while<br />
the Panzer Lehr attacked Humain and<br />
Buissonville to reopen the line of com-<br />
munication.<br />
In addition the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
commander had plans to employ the<br />
divisions already in this northwestern<br />
sector <strong>as</strong> the vertebrae on which a full-<br />
bodied and integrated salient could be<br />
developed reaching to and overlapping<br />
the Meuse. The right shoulder of the ex-<br />
panding salient would, in Manteuffel’s<br />
plan, be formed by the 116th Panzer<br />
Division. This unit w<strong>as</strong> now in full force<br />
on the west bank of the Ourthe, had<br />
penetrated the American line at Ver-<br />
denne, and w<strong>as</strong> in position to bring<br />
artillery fire on the Hotton-Marche road.<br />
The objective given the 116th Panzer,<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore, w<strong>as</strong> the town of Baillonville<br />
(north of Marche), from w<strong>here</strong> it could<br />
block an Allied attack southward along<br />
the highway from Liège to Marche. The<br />
9th Panzer Division, upon arrival, w<strong>as</strong><br />
ticketed to take position on the right of<br />
the Panzer Lehr, thus beefing up the 2d<br />
Panzer attack in the center. This w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
German plan for 25 December.<br />
The Celles Pocket<br />
Although the VII Corps had become<br />
involved in a defensive battle, General<br />
Collins still expected to launch the<br />
corps counterattack which would signal<br />
the beginning of aggressive operations<br />
against the north flank of the Bulge. In<br />
midafternoon on 24 December General<br />
Harmon telephoned the VII Corps<br />
command post and <strong>as</strong>ked permission<br />
to throw another combat command<br />
of his 2d Armored Division against<br />
elements of the 2d Panzer which had<br />
been identified in the neighborhood of<br />
Ciney and Celles. (See Map VIII.) The<br />
corps commander w<strong>as</strong> away from the<br />
command post visiting his divisions; so<br />
the call w<strong>as</strong> taken by the corps artillery<br />
commander, Brig. Gen. Williston B.<br />
Palmer. Palmer knew that the First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> had attached strings to any whole-<br />
sale commitment of Harmon’s division<br />
and that Hodges’ consent and probably<br />
Montgomery’s would be needed before<br />
more of the 2d Armored w<strong>as</strong> unle<strong>as</strong>hed.<br />
He t<strong>here</strong>fore told Harmon to wait–it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> too late in the day to launch an<br />
attack in any c<strong>as</strong>e-until the corps com-<br />
mander reached the 2d Armored com-<br />
mand post. Harmon w<strong>as</strong> persistent and<br />
called again <strong>as</strong>king for “immediate au-<br />
thority.” Palmer, sorely tempted to give<br />
Harmon the permission he needed, re-<br />
luctantly steeled himself and told Har-<br />
mon to await Collins’ appearance at the<br />
2d Armored command post.<br />
A few minutes later Palmer had a call<br />
from the First <strong>Army</strong> chief of staff,<br />
General Kean, who said that Collins w<strong>as</strong><br />
authorized to use all his corps and could<br />
change his defensive line. In guarded<br />
words Kean <strong>as</strong>ked Palmer if he saw “a<br />
town A and a town H” on the map and<br />
then mentioned a “pivoting move.”<br />
Palmer, imbued with Collins’ attack<br />
philosphy and eager to give the green<br />
light to the 2d Armored, looked h<strong>as</strong>tily<br />
at the map spread before him, picked out<br />
two villages southwest of Ciney and<br />
forward of the 2d Armored positions:<br />
Achêne and (Le) Houisse. This looked
566 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
like the go signal for the VII Corps and<br />
an attack to advance its western wing.<br />
Because the wire line to the 2d Armored<br />
command post had gone out, Palmer<br />
sent his aide with a message for Collins<br />
giving his own optimistic interpretation<br />
of the conversation with Kean.<br />
The aide had just departed when<br />
Kean called again. On further reflection,<br />
he said (perhaps Kean had caught a tone<br />
of exultation in Palmer’s voice), he<br />
doubted whether Palmer had under-<br />
stood him correctly. Then came the cold<br />
water douche: “Now get this. I’m only<br />
going to say it once. Roll with the<br />
punch.” Palmer’s glance flicked over the<br />
map, this time to the north; t<strong>here</strong>, thirty<br />
miles to the rear of the villages he had<br />
selected earlier were the towns of An-<br />
denne and Huy. Palmer remembers that<br />
this w<strong>as</strong> the only moment in the war<br />
when he w<strong>as</strong> “ill with disapproval.”<br />
Out went a second messenger with an<br />
explanation of Palmer’s mistake and an<br />
urgent request for Collins to come home.<br />
Collins, who had received the first mes-<br />
sage at Harmon’s command post, w<strong>as</strong> just<br />
giving the finishing touches to an attack<br />
plan for the entire 2d Armored when the<br />
second messenger appeared. Telling<br />
Harmon to “hold everything” but mak-<br />
ing clear that the 2d Armored w<strong>as</strong> to go<br />
ahead with plans for the attack on<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> morning, Collins hurried back<br />
to his own headquarters. He arrived<br />
t<strong>here</strong> about 1830 but nothing more could<br />
be done until a liaison officer, promised<br />
by Kean, came in from the First <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
Two hours later the First <strong>Army</strong> staff<br />
officer (Col. R. F. Akers) appeared and<br />
confirmed the bad news. Montgomery<br />
and Hodges had agreed to shorten the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> line in order to halt the<br />
German advance. The VII corps, t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
fore, w<strong>as</strong> to go on the defensive and its<br />
commander w<strong>as</strong> “authorized” on his<br />
own judgment to drop back to the line<br />
Andenne-Hotton-Manhay. In any c<strong>as</strong>e<br />
the VII Corps w<strong>as</strong> to retain a firm con-<br />
tact with the XVIII Airborne Corps,<br />
which that evening w<strong>as</strong> withdrawing to<br />
the Manhay position.<br />
Although General Collins courteously<br />
<strong>as</strong>ked the senior members of his corps<br />
staff to give their opinions on the action<br />
now to be taken by the corps, neither he<br />
nor any of his officers considered giving<br />
over the attack planned for the 2d Ar-<br />
mored. During the day Harmon’s tanks<br />
had inflicted very severe damage on the<br />
German columns; the 84th Division had<br />
experienced some reverses but seemed to<br />
be holding its own. On balance the pic-<br />
ture <strong>as</strong> seen from the VII Corps’ point of<br />
view w<strong>as</strong> far less gloomy than that ap-<br />
parently prevailing in higher headquar-<br />
ters. Collins recognized that a retrograde<br />
move would strengthen the defenses of<br />
Huy and Liège. He also knew that such<br />
a move would expose Namur and the<br />
major Meuse crossings south of that city,<br />
for example, those at Dinant. The final<br />
decision, made by the corps commander<br />
himself, probably could have been pre-<br />
dicted: on 25 December the 2d Armored<br />
Division would advance <strong>as</strong> planned; the<br />
corps then would continue with limited<br />
objective attacks to break up any danger-<br />
ous concentration of enemy forces on its<br />
front. 7<br />
The boundary between the VII Corps<br />
and the XVIII Airborne Corps lay<br />
generally along the direct road from<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne to Liège, but this w<strong>as</strong> essen-<br />
7 General Collins had a detailed memorandum<br />
on these events prepared by his staff and later<br />
kindly provided a photostat copy to the author.
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E 567<br />
tially an artificial division and coincided<br />
neither with the compartmentalization<br />
of the terrain, naturally divided <strong>as</strong> it w<strong>as</strong><br />
by the Ourthe River, nor with the man-<br />
ner in which the German attack w<strong>as</strong><br />
developing. 8 The ebb and flow of the<br />
battle on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day may best be<br />
understood by tracing the movements of<br />
three German divisions: the 2d Panzer,<br />
the Panzer Lehr, and the 116th Panzer.<br />
Perhaps it would be more accurate to say<br />
the attempted movements, for the day<br />
came bright and clear, bringing the<br />
American and British air forces into the<br />
skies over the Bulge in one of the greatest<br />
demonstrations of tactical ground sup-<br />
port ever witnessed by American troops.<br />
By the morning of the 25th the ad-<br />
vance kampfgruppe of the 2d Panzer had<br />
been split in two, in part by a loss of<br />
direction during the night march toward<br />
Dinant, in part by the activity of Ameri-<br />
can tank patrols operating out of Ciney,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> CCB of the 2d Armored had<br />
established its b<strong>as</strong>e for future operations.<br />
The 2d Panzer reconnaissance battalion<br />
and a part of the German artillery col-<br />
umn had bivouacked near Foy–Notre<br />
Dame, only four or five miles from the<br />
bridges at Dinant. Major Cochenhausen,<br />
who commanded the main column, in-<br />
cluding a tank battalion and a regiment<br />
of panzer grenadiers, halted at daylight<br />
in the woods southwest of Conneaux–<br />
perhaps 5,000 meters behind the detach-<br />
ment in Foy–Notre Dame.<br />
Lauchert, the division commander,<br />
8 The present chapter will be concerned only<br />
with the battles fought by those troops of the<br />
VII Corps which were west of Hotton on 25<br />
December. The next chapter will deal with the<br />
remaining combat elements of Collins’ corps <strong>as</strong><br />
these played their part in the XVIII Airborne<br />
Corps’ fight farther e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
w<strong>as</strong> acutely aware of the perilous situa-<br />
tion confronting his forward troops and<br />
knew they had to be reinforced and<br />
resupplied at once. His orders, however,<br />
were to use the rest of his division to<br />
protect the right flank of Luettwitz’<br />
XLVII Panzer Corps in the Marche sec-<br />
tor until the incoming 9th Panzer<br />
Division could take over the t<strong>as</strong>k. Since<br />
the Americans in and around Marche<br />
seemed quiet, Lauchert proposed to<br />
Luettwitz that he be relieved of this<br />
security mission. While Panzer Lehr<br />
attacked west of Marche to reopen the<br />
road, Lauchert wanted to switch the<br />
main body of his division back through<br />
Rochefort, then push northwest to the<br />
troops in what German reports already<br />
were calling the Conneaux Pocket. At<br />
first Luettwitz would not listen to the<br />
importunate Lauchert. Probably the re-<br />
fusal made no difference. As Lauchert<br />
himself admits, the air w<strong>as</strong> so thick with<br />
Allied Jabos that his tactical units could<br />
not move during the daylight hours, nor<br />
w<strong>as</strong> t<strong>here</strong> a German interceptor plane<br />
to be seen this far to the west.<br />
In the early afternoon Manteuffel and<br />
his chief of staff visited General Luett-<br />
witz. The latter once more proposed that<br />
the forward echelons of the 2d Panzer<br />
be withdrawn-although he w<strong>as</strong> well<br />
aware that such a decision w<strong>as</strong> beyond<br />
the power of the Fifth <strong>Army</strong> commander<br />
-and once again w<strong>as</strong> refused. Something<br />
might be done, however. Since a kampf-<br />
gruppe of the 9th Panzer w<strong>as</strong> finally at<br />
hand and could be used to relieve<br />
Lauchert in the Hargimont sector facing<br />
Marche, the 2d Panzer commander re-<br />
ceived permission to carry out his relief<br />
operation. All day long radio reports<br />
from Cochenhausen had told of bitter<br />
fighting, heavy losses at the hands of
568 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Allied planes and tanks, dwindling am-<br />
munition, and no fuel. Now, just <strong>as</strong><br />
Lauchert had his orders in hand, he<br />
heard that radio contact with the force<br />
cut off at Foy—Notre Dame had ce<strong>as</strong>ed.<br />
The attack mapped out by Collins and<br />
Harmon late the previous afternoon w<strong>as</strong><br />
launched by CCB at 0800 on Christm<strong>as</strong><br />
Day, the idea a double-pronged sweep to<br />
capture Celles and annihilate the Ger-<br />
man armor believed to be t<strong>here</strong>abouts. 9<br />
For this maneuver General White di-<br />
vided his command into two t<strong>as</strong>k forces.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force A (Lt. Col. Harry Hillyard)<br />
had its line of departure on the Achene<br />
road and orders to take the Bois de<br />
Geauvelant, a large wood some thousand<br />
meters across, which lay midway between<br />
Achene and Celles. It w<strong>as</strong> to <strong>as</strong>semble<br />
for the final <strong>as</strong>sault on high ground<br />
northwest of Celles. T<strong>as</strong>k Force B (Maj.<br />
Clifton B. Batchelder) , starting its<br />
move near Leignon, w<strong>as</strong> to make the<br />
main envelopment and cut off Celles on<br />
the southe<strong>as</strong>t. The 82d Armored Recon-<br />
naissance Battalion went in on the open<br />
right flank of the attack to screen toward<br />
the west and <strong>as</strong> far forward <strong>as</strong> the Lesse<br />
River, south of Celles. CCB would be<br />
supported by artillery emplaced west of<br />
Ciney and by both American and British<br />
fighter-bombers.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force A, medium tanks to the<br />
front, went through the Bois de Geauve-<br />
lant with almost no opposition. As it<br />
debouched it came under fire from a<br />
little farm near Foy–Notre Dame and<br />
9 For the American sources used in this chapter<br />
see the bibliographical notes included in the foot-<br />
notes to Chapter XVIII. T<strong>here</strong> are a number of<br />
combat interviews covering the 2d Armored Divi-<br />
sion during this period. General Harmon’s own<br />
story is told in an article entitled, “We Gambled<br />
in the Battle of the Bulge,” The Saturday Eve-<br />
ning Post (October 2, 1948).<br />
lost three half-tracks. The 370th Fighter<br />
Group of the IX Tactical Air Command,<br />
flying in support of CCB, then flushed<br />
out four Panther tanks and put them<br />
out of action, at le<strong>as</strong>t temporarily. The<br />
column again drew fire near Boisselles,<br />
but two platoons of the 67th Armored<br />
Regiment moved in and destroyed three<br />
Panthers doing the shooting. By the<br />
middle of the afternoon T<strong>as</strong>k Force A<br />
reached the high ground overlooking<br />
Celles, blocking the roads to the west<br />
and southwest. T<strong>as</strong>k Force B had a brief<br />
battle at Conjoux, then rushed on–<br />
knocking out isolated tanks and guns–<br />
until it arrived on the ridge 1,300 yards<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t of Celles.<br />
The British 29th Armoured Brigade<br />
w<strong>as</strong> conducting its own private battle<br />
west of Foy–Notre Dame while pushing<br />
reconnaissance toward the Lesse River.<br />
The British knocked out three Panthers<br />
and some infantry near Sorinne, then<br />
shot up more German vehicles and took<br />
prisoners around Foy–Notre Dame. In<br />
the skirmish near Boisselles a few tanks<br />
of the British 3d Royal Tank Regiment<br />
and some British gunners gave a hand to<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force A. 10<br />
Meanwhile the 82d Reconnaissance<br />
Battalion had run into the remnants of<br />
the 2d Panzer reconnaissance battalion<br />
at Foy–Notre Dame (part of this group<br />
had escaped e<strong>as</strong>tward to rejoin the main<br />
force huddled in the woods northe<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Celles) . These Germans intended to<br />
make a fight of it, though at first sight<br />
Foy–Notre Dame seemed a peaceful<br />
farming village-nothing more. When a<br />
10 British participation is acknowledged in the<br />
CCB AAR, 25 December 1944. See also MS, 30<br />
Corps, Operations during the German Attack in<br />
the Ardennes, December 1944–January 1945 in<br />
Hist Div ETO<strong>US</strong>A files.
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E 569<br />
platoon from the 82d moved in, the<br />
enemy began a fusillade of antitank and<br />
machine gun fire from hidden positions.<br />
Worse, four Panthers on high ground<br />
just south of the village took a hand.<br />
The American cavalry suffered some<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties, but Sergeant Rogers used<br />
his <strong>as</strong>sault gun to charge a German<br />
antitank gun in the middle of the village<br />
and the mop-up began. The four Pan-<br />
thers were brought under fire by Brit-<br />
ish gunners, then finally destroyed by<br />
air attack. (Probably these were the<br />
tanks which had struck T<strong>as</strong>k Force A<br />
near the Bois de Geauvelant.) This<br />
skirmish marked the end of the German<br />
reconnaissance battalion: the com-<br />
mander and 147 others were captured,<br />
and much of its remaining equipment<br />
w<strong>as</strong> taken.<br />
When General White’s two t<strong>as</strong>k forces<br />
finally sent tanks into Celles they met<br />
little resistance. At first it seemed empty<br />
except for the townspeople who had<br />
gat<strong>here</strong>d in the church; later some 200<br />
dispirited prisoners were rounded up in<br />
and near the town. With the capture of<br />
Celles the string w<strong>as</strong> drawn on the bag<br />
in the forest between that town and<br />
Conjoux. Harmon ordered CCB to turn<br />
back the next morning and give the<br />
coup de grâce to the trapped enemy.<br />
Although Christm<strong>as</strong> Day had brought<br />
much sporadic action and occ<strong>as</strong>ional<br />
flare-ups like the fight at Foy–Notre<br />
Dame the main German pocket simply<br />
had been byp<strong>as</strong>sed. It is known that<br />
Cochenhausen’s tanks had very little<br />
g<strong>as</strong>oline, probably not enough to permit<br />
any appreciable skirmishing or tactical<br />
movement, but the German sluggishness<br />
in the pocket may be credited to the<br />
gunners supporting CCB, the army pilots<br />
in their “flying OP’s,” and the close co-<br />
ordination between the artillery and the<br />
fighter-bombers of the 370th Fighter<br />
Group and Royal Air Force 83 Group.<br />
At noon, for example, a spotter plane<br />
picked up a column of seven enemy<br />
tanks north of Celles–all were destroyed<br />
by artillery fire. Twelve P–38’s and an<br />
unknown number of British Typhoons,<br />
taking time out only to replenish fuel<br />
tanks and ammunition racks, worked<br />
over the woods w<strong>here</strong> lay Cochen-<br />
hausen’s command and strafed roads and<br />
trails whenever vehicles showed signs of<br />
making a break for it.<br />
What of the German efforts to reach<br />
Cochenhausen’s force? Two small forays<br />
were attempted during the day by the<br />
Panzer Lehr, whose commander had<br />
dispatched tanks along the Custinne<br />
road toward Celles, but these efforts<br />
were foiled by the ubiquitous Allied<br />
planes. That night the kampfgruppe<br />
with which the 2d Panzer had been<br />
blocking in the Hargimont sector w<strong>as</strong><br />
relieved by the 9th Panzer, and Lauchert<br />
finally w<strong>as</strong> free to attempt Cochen-<br />
hausen’s relief. The force which he led<br />
from the Rochefort road through the<br />
Bois de Famenne and Ciergnon w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
likely to give much confidence of suc-<br />
cess: a company or two of tanks, a bat-<br />
talion of armored infantry, a light<br />
artillery battalion, two companies of<br />
engineers, and part of a flak battalion.<br />
The Germans had neared the twin<br />
villages of Petite and Grande Trisogne,<br />
little more than a mile from Celles, when<br />
they saw the ridge ahead “crawling with<br />
tanks.” (These may have been British<br />
tanks because the 29th Armoured Bri-<br />
gade w<strong>as</strong> blocking behind the CCB<br />
lines.) 11 The 2d Panzer never got to<br />
11 CCB AAR, 26 Dec 44.
570 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
launch an attack, for the American guns<br />
opened “a hellish fire” (their targets<br />
spotted-<strong>as</strong> Lauchert later recalled-by<br />
five artillery planes). Then to top this<br />
came the P–38’s and Typhoons. On<br />
nearby roads more Allied tanks hove in<br />
sight but made no concerted attack.<br />
Lauchert’s group w<strong>as</strong> saved by an order<br />
radioed from the XLVII Panzer Corps:<br />
he w<strong>as</strong> to return to Rochefort at once;<br />
the troops in the pocket would have to<br />
destroy their vehicles, leave their<br />
wounded, and get out on foot. A Panzer<br />
Lehr attempt to reach the pocket via<br />
Custinne on 26 December w<strong>as</strong> equally<br />
futile, and for the same re<strong>as</strong>ons. Bayer-<br />
lein’s kampfgruppe–at no time in the<br />
battles on the Marche front did the<br />
Panzer Lehr commander have his entire<br />
division in hand-also w<strong>as</strong> ordered back<br />
to Rochefort during the night of 26<br />
December.<br />
The story of the 2d Panzer pocket is<br />
quickly told. CCB spent two days clear-<br />
ing the thick woods and dense under-<br />
brush between Celles and Conjoux. The<br />
procedure w<strong>as</strong> simple and effective: first,<br />
heavy shelling on a given area, then a<br />
slow, methodical advance by the infantry<br />
line backed with the tanks. In an exten-<br />
sion of the Bois de Geauvelant, w<strong>here</strong><br />
tanks could operate with some freedom,<br />
an armored sweep w<strong>as</strong> made which<br />
killed about 150 of the enemy. In the<br />
main forest near Celles a final squeeze<br />
produced 200 prisoners, 12 guns, and 80<br />
vehicles of various types to add to the<br />
larger bag. Nonetheless many of the<br />
German troops did succeed in escaping<br />
on foot. Major von Cochenhausen and<br />
nearly 600 of his men ultimately reached<br />
Rochefort, but all the equipment of the<br />
reconnaissance battalion, the 304th Pan-<br />
zer Grenadier Regiment, the 2d Battal-<br />
ion of the 3d Panzer Regiment, three<br />
artillery battalions, and two-thirds of the<br />
division flak battalion had to be left<br />
behind. 12<br />
The Fight at Humain<br />
The 2d Armored Division’s “limited<br />
objective” attack, so carefully planned<br />
for Christm<strong>as</strong> Day, included a drive by<br />
CCA straight south from Buissonville on<br />
the paved highway to Rochefort, t<strong>here</strong> to<br />
relieve the battalion of the 84th Division.<br />
This move never w<strong>as</strong> carried through,<br />
although Harmon did not learn that the<br />
Rochefort troops had escaped until early<br />
afternoon. Instead CCA and the 4th<br />
Cavalry Group were caught up in a quite<br />
unexpected battle whose focal point w<strong>as</strong><br />
Humain, e<strong>as</strong>t of Buissonville. During<br />
the night of 24 December Troop A of<br />
the 24th Cavalry Squadron occupied<br />
Humain <strong>as</strong> an outpost for the CCA<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembly area at Buissonville. But the<br />
troopers had short tenure in Humain,<br />
for across the lines the Panzer Lehr w<strong>as</strong><br />
gathering its few tanks to break the<br />
American stranglehold on the throat of<br />
the 2d Panzer spearhead. Bayerlein di-<br />
vided his Panthers into two <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
groups: a platoon, supported by a rifle<br />
company, to seize Humain; a company,<br />
reinforced by an understrength rifle bat-<br />
talion, to drive on the left for Havrenne,<br />
then Buissonville.<br />
The German blow struck Humain at<br />
first light, driving the cavalry out of<br />
town. The attack to the west rolled p<strong>as</strong>t<br />
the burned-out relics of the American<br />
12 The dramatic end of the hopes nourished for<br />
the 2d Panzer and Panzer Lehr find expression in<br />
very detailed recollections by Lauchert; Bayerlein,<br />
MSS # A-941, A-943, and A-944; and Luettwitz,<br />
MSS # A-938 and A-940.
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E 571<br />
successes of the day before– 2d Panzer<br />
trucks, many armored cars, half-tracks,<br />
and, near Havrenne, the guns of an<br />
entire artillery battalion. Havrenne be-<br />
ing empty, the German column moved<br />
on toward Buissonville, Here a ruse w<strong>as</strong><br />
tried and worked. A German officer in<br />
American uniform went forward to the<br />
two Sherman tanks guarding the bridge<br />
over which the Havrenne road entered<br />
Buissonville; so effective an actor w<strong>as</strong> he<br />
that the tank crews obeyed without ques-<br />
tion his order that they return to their<br />
bivouac. Four of the German tanks actu-<br />
ally crossed the bridge at daylight, but<br />
were driven out by fire from the CCA<br />
tanks’ guns. On the heels of this skirm-<br />
ish, the leading CCA t<strong>as</strong>k force started<br />
down the road for Rochefort. Near<br />
Havrenne the Panther company at-<br />
tempted to make a stand but w<strong>as</strong> out-<br />
gunned and lost five tanks. Havrenne<br />
fell to the Americans, but CCA discon-<br />
tinued the advance toward Rochefort<br />
for by this time it w<strong>as</strong> known that the<br />
friendly infantry t<strong>here</strong> had escaped.<br />
Meanwhile a considerable threat w<strong>as</strong><br />
looming on the exposed flank at Hu-<br />
main.<br />
Col. John C. MacDonald’s 4th Cavalry<br />
Group had set about retaking Humain,<br />
but his light tanks and tank destroyers<br />
were no match for the heavier German<br />
Panthers; nor could the American <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
guns get a direct shot at them, shielded<br />
<strong>as</strong> they were behind the stone walls of<br />
the village. MacDonald tried a dis-<br />
mounted <strong>as</strong>sault, but this failed. Artil-<br />
lery w<strong>as</strong> unable to dislodge the enemy.<br />
Late in the afternoon Harmon sent a<br />
company of medium tanks to <strong>as</strong>sist the<br />
24th Cavalry Squadron. One l<strong>as</strong>t attack<br />
w<strong>as</strong> made in the waning daylight-this,<br />
too, made no headway. At midnight<br />
General Collier, on his own cognizance,<br />
ordered the American cavalry to with-<br />
draw, blocking the roads to the north and<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t lest the enemy erupt toward Marche.<br />
When the 26th dawned the defenders<br />
had a fresh force in the town. Panzer<br />
Lehr, it will be remembered, had been<br />
relieved during the night by the 9th<br />
Panzer to engage in the sortie toward<br />
Celles. The 9th Panzer Division (Brig.<br />
Gen. Elverfeldt) had been brought from<br />
Holland on 22 December. In view of its<br />
exposure to air attack and delays while<br />
it waited along the road for tank fuel the<br />
division had made very good time, albeit<br />
arriving in the battle line a day behind<br />
schedule. A veteran of the Arnhem and<br />
Aachen battles (it had opposed the 84th<br />
Infantry Division at Geronsweiler in the<br />
north), the 9th Panzer may have had <strong>as</strong><br />
many <strong>as</strong> 90 tanks and 35 self-propelled<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns or tank destroyers. Appar-<br />
ently the division artillery regiment did<br />
not arrive until three or four days later.<br />
When the first march column reached<br />
the line on the afternoon of the 25th it<br />
deployed south of Marche, t<strong>here</strong> taking<br />
over the Marloie-Hedree blocking posi-<br />
tion held by the 2d Panzer.<br />
As more troops arrived the 9th Panzer<br />
extended westward, thus including<br />
Humain in its bailiwick, but Elverfeldt’s<br />
fresh division had more than a defensive<br />
mission. Although Luettwitz intended to<br />
employ this new armor to nourish the<br />
drive westward, it is questionable<br />
whether the XLVII Panzer Corps com-<br />
mander had anything more in mind than<br />
the defeat of the American armor e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the Meuse when he gave the 9th<br />
Panzer its orders on the night of 25<br />
December: attack from the Humain sec-<br />
tor and take Buissonville.<br />
About 0700 the cavalry observation
572<br />
posts north of Humain saw tanks defiling<br />
from the town onto the Havrenne-Buis-<br />
sonville road. This word w<strong>as</strong> fl<strong>as</strong>hed to<br />
the 2d Armored command post w<strong>here</strong><br />
Harmon ordered Col. Carl Hutton, the<br />
division artillery commander, to fire a<br />
“serenade” (a TOT) on Humain with<br />
all the 155-mm. and 8-inch battalions in<br />
range “right away.” The avalanche of<br />
heavy shells falling in Humain did not<br />
disrupt the German attack formation en<br />
route to Havrenne but may have pre-<br />
vented its prompt reinforcement. The<br />
engagement at Havrenne began within<br />
a half-hour, carried by fifteen Panther<br />
tanks and a battalion of grenadiers from<br />
the 10th Panzer Grenadier riding in<br />
armored half-tracks. At the edge of the<br />
village the German infantry took over<br />
the initial <strong>as</strong>sault, only to be beaten off<br />
by tank guns, tank destroyers, and artil-<br />
lery. Company I of the 66th Armored<br />
Regiment, with its attached platoons of<br />
infantry and tank destroyers, met and<br />
threw back three separate attacks during<br />
the day. The job w<strong>as</strong> made e<strong>as</strong>ier by the<br />
capture of the German attack plan and<br />
the warm attention paid Humain–the<br />
German sally port–by Hutton’s artillery<br />
and MacDonald’s light armor, the latter<br />
engaged in shooting up the thin-skinned<br />
half-tracks bringing reinforcements into<br />
Humain.<br />
It may seem strange that the 9th Pan-<br />
zer, with fresh troops and close to its full<br />
tank complement, did not press the at-<br />
tack against CCA. But the 9th, like the<br />
2d Panzer and Panzer Lehr before it,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> fighting with one arm behind its<br />
back. Luettwitz, gravely concerned that<br />
the Americans might break through west<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne and surge north to cut off the<br />
divisions in the salient beyond Roche-<br />
fort, turned the blocking position at<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Rochefort over to the 9th Panzer, leaving<br />
that division with its line bent at a right<br />
angle.<br />
All through the night of 26 December<br />
the medium and heavy calibers of the 2d<br />
Armored Division artillery bl<strong>as</strong>ted away<br />
at the Germans in Humain. The town<br />
had to be retaken, for it presented a con-<br />
tinuing point of entry into the left flank<br />
of the 2d Armored. But <strong>as</strong> part of the<br />
larger VII Corps’ scheme, Harmon had<br />
the t<strong>as</strong>k of carrying forward the Ameri-<br />
can front to the e<strong>as</strong>t-west line of the<br />
L’Homme and Lesse Rivers. For this<br />
general advance Harmon brought up<br />
CCR (Col. Sidney R. Hinds), which had<br />
been waiting at Hogne since Christm<strong>as</strong><br />
Day, and attached it to Collier’s CCA.<br />
Collier ordered CCR to take on the<br />
Panthers in Humain and sent CCA to<br />
clear the large forested area and the<br />
roads running south to Rochefort and<br />
L’Homme. CCB w<strong>as</strong> thus left in the west<br />
to eradicate the l<strong>as</strong>t remnants of the<br />
Celles pocket while extending patrols,<br />
in co-operation with the British 29th<br />
Armoured Brigade–all of its troops now<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of the Meuse–to the line of the<br />
Lesse River.<br />
<strong>To</strong> trap the Humain garrison, Colonel<br />
Hinds made his attack on the morning<br />
of the 27th with tanks circling south,<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, and west of the town, and the ar-<br />
mored infantry moving in from the<br />
north. The 2d Battalion (Lt. Col. Lem-<br />
uel E. Pope) of the 67th Armored Regi-<br />
ment had isolated Humain by 1015 but<br />
found the Panthers missing, driven out<br />
during the night by the artillery bom-<br />
bardment. T<strong>here</strong> remained considerable<br />
bite in the Humain defenders and<br />
they momentarily halted the Amer-<br />
ican tank column led by Pope.<br />
Pope went to the head of the column,
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E 573<br />
2D ARMORED DIVISION INFANTRYMEN MOVING TO NEW POSITIONS durng the fight<br />
for Humain.<br />
reorganized the formation under in-<br />
tense fire, and started the attack<br />
moving again. (Colonel Pope w<strong>as</strong><br />
awarded the DSC.) By noon CCR w<strong>as</strong><br />
in Humain, w<strong>here</strong> it took another ten<br />
hours to clear the houses of the 150<br />
grenadiers who had been left behind.<br />
Even while this fight w<strong>as</strong> in progress<br />
Harmon telephoned Collier to “go to the<br />
river with abandon.”<br />
This w<strong>as</strong> not quite the end of the<br />
three-day battle. An artillery spotter<br />
plane flying over Hargimont in the early<br />
afternoon saw a column of German ve-<br />
hicles gathering for a march down the<br />
Humain road. It seems rather appropri-<br />
ate that this l<strong>as</strong>t effort against the 2d<br />
Armored should have been dealt with<br />
by the fighter-bombers whose co-opera-<br />
tion had contributed in striking me<strong>as</strong>ure<br />
to the 2d Armored successes before the<br />
Meuse. Fourteen P–38’s from the 379th<br />
Fighter Group struck Hargimont and,<br />
<strong>as</strong> a cavalry outpost happily reported,<br />
“gave them everything they had.” Two<br />
more flights were vectored in: “much<br />
flame and smoke observed.” As a final<br />
and fitting gesture of Allied co-operation<br />
it may be noted that CCR, faced with a<br />
stubborn hold-out detachment in a large<br />
château e<strong>as</strong>t of Humain, called on the<br />
flame-throwing Crocodile tanks of the
574 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Scottish Fife and Forfar Yeomanry to<br />
apply the finishing touch to the fight for<br />
Humain. 13<br />
The ill-fated battle of the XLVII<br />
Panzer Corps in front of Dinant w<strong>as</strong><br />
ended. Luettwitz had new orders: his<br />
corps must make one final, all-out effort<br />
to take B<strong>as</strong>togne, leaving a minimum<br />
force in the Rochefort area to guard its<br />
back. Across the lines, on 28 December,<br />
the 83d Infantry Division and the Brit-<br />
ish 53d Division began to replace the 2d<br />
Armored Division combat commands. 14<br />
By 31 December the 2d Armored w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
billets, belatedly eating its Christm<strong>as</strong><br />
dinner. During the brief operation e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the Meuse the 2d Armored Division<br />
had racked up a considerable tally: 1,213<br />
prisoners taken, 82 tanks, 83 guns, and<br />
441 vehicles captured or destroyed. The<br />
American losses in armor were light: 5<br />
light tanks and 22 mediums. The fight<br />
had cost the 2d Armored Division and its<br />
attached units 17 killed, 26 missing, and<br />
201 wounded-an illuminating commen-<br />
tary on the use by a veteran formation of<br />
the combined arms, the impossibility of<br />
striking power in<strong>here</strong>nt in the piecemeal<br />
tactics employed by the enemy, the lack<br />
of a strong German artillery to counter<br />
the weight of metal always available to<br />
the Americans, and the complete absence<br />
of German attack planes in skies ruled<br />
by the American and British fighter-<br />
bombers.<br />
13 CCR AAR, 27 Dec 44.<br />
14 The 2d Armored still w<strong>as</strong> in contact with the<br />
enemy on 28 December. Pvt. C. W. Dilling-<br />
ham w<strong>as</strong> given the DSC for bravery in breaking<br />
through a defended roadblock with his tank; Pfc.<br />
F. S. Rose w<strong>as</strong> given the DSC for crawling with a<br />
broken leg for one and a half miles through snow<br />
and cold to bring aid to his mortally, wounded<br />
scout section leader after their jeep had hit a<br />
double Teller mine.<br />
The Fight at Verdenne<br />
On the night of 24 December the 84th<br />
Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong> deployed along an<br />
arc of some twelve miles reaching from<br />
Hogne, northwest of Marche, through<br />
Waha, south of Marche, thence bowing<br />
back to the northe<strong>as</strong>t in front of the<br />
Marche-Hotton road. 15 On the right, the<br />
4th Cavalry Group formed a screen m<strong>as</strong>k-<br />
ing the infantry line. The center at the<br />
moment w<strong>as</strong> quiet, but on the left the<br />
116th Panzer Division had broken<br />
through the outpost line and despite the<br />
successful American counterattack made<br />
late in the afternoon still held an en-<br />
trant position at Verdenne.<br />
The 116th Panzer faced a lone battle<br />
<strong>as</strong> it prepared to carry out the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> orders for attack westward.<br />
Thus far the fighting on its right in the<br />
sector e<strong>as</strong>t of the Ourthe River had not<br />
gone too well; neither the 2d SS Panzer<br />
nor the 560th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
managing to gain ground on the 24th.<br />
<strong>To</strong> the left the attention of the 2d Pan-<br />
zer w<strong>as</strong> centered on Foy–Notre Dame<br />
and Celles far to the west. Nonetheless<br />
so long <strong>as</strong> Luettwitz’ armor had any<br />
chance of breaking through to the Meuse<br />
the 116th had to continue its attack to<br />
breach the American defenses north of<br />
Marche and press forward <strong>as</strong> a covering<br />
shell for the drive to Dinant.<br />
General Bolling knew that some Ger-<br />
mans still were around Verdenne on the<br />
night of 24 December, but the 84th Di-<br />
vision w<strong>as</strong> unaware that the enemy had<br />
slipped on into the woods between<br />
Verdenne and Bourdon until a lucky<br />
fluke revealed the new threat. About<br />
15 Sources used in this section are the same <strong>as</strong><br />
those cited in Chapter XVIII.
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E 575<br />
midnight Companies A and K of the<br />
334th Infantry and Company L, 333d<br />
Infantry, started along the woods trails<br />
and byroads to converge in a night <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault against Verdenne. Moving in from<br />
the west, Company K took a wrong turn<br />
and suddenly bumped into a column of<br />
six or eight tanks. Sgt. Donald Phelps,<br />
marching at the point, went forward to<br />
check the lead tank. Suddenly a figure<br />
leaning out of the tank shouted, “Halt!”<br />
Phelps, recognizing the German accent,<br />
took a snap shot at the figure who<br />
screamed <strong>as</strong> the bullet struck. The<br />
German tanks opened fire with not only<br />
their machine guns but their main arma-<br />
ment, and the American infantry file hit<br />
the dirt. Severely lacerated before it<br />
could break away, the remaining forty<br />
men of Company K joined the main <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault against Verdenne an hour later.<br />
The Germans inside Verdenne had<br />
been softened by an intense preparatory<br />
shelling and the American infantry suc-<br />
ceeded in getting clear through the<br />
village–although fighting resumed in<br />
daylight with the dangerous t<strong>as</strong>k of house<br />
clearing. One enemy tank showed up<br />
during the night, but Sgt. E. T. Rein-<br />
eke killed the tank commander with<br />
a rifle ball, then tossed a grenade into the<br />
open turret. More American infantry<br />
arrived in the morning, and by the end<br />
of Christm<strong>as</strong> Day 289 Germans had<br />
surrendered.<br />
The seizure of Verdenne c<strong>as</strong>t a loop<br />
around the German tanks and infantry<br />
in the woods north of the village. At<br />
noon on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day a tank company<br />
from the 16th Panzer Regiment tried an<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault in staggered formation against<br />
Verdenne but found Company B of the<br />
771st Tank Battalion waiting and lost<br />
nine tanks–its entire complement.<br />
Waldenburg still had hopes that the de-<br />
tachment in the woods could be saved,<br />
for during the day the Fuehrer Begleit<br />
Brigade came in on his right, freeing<br />
the troops he had deployed to watch<br />
Hampteau and the Hotton approaches.<br />
More than this, Waldenburg apparently<br />
expected to use the wedge which would<br />
be created in reaching the pocket <strong>as</strong> a<br />
means of splitting the Marche-Hotton<br />
line and starting the major advance west-<br />
ward.<br />
The area in which the Germans were<br />
hemmed posed a very neat problem in<br />
minor tactics. It w<strong>as</strong> about 800 yards by<br />
300, densely wooded, and shaped with<br />
an inner declivity somewhat like a serv-<br />
ing platter. Guns beyond the rim could<br />
not bring direct fire on the targets inside,<br />
and tanks rolling down into the pocket<br />
would be exposed before they could<br />
train their weapons. Tanks inside the<br />
pocket would be in the same position if<br />
they moved up and over the edge. As-<br />
sault by infantry could be met with tank<br />
fire whether the <strong>as</strong>sault went into or<br />
came out of the pocket.<br />
Just such an <strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong> the first tried<br />
by the 333d Infantry, which put Com-<br />
panies A and B into a predawn attack<br />
on 26 December. The American skir-<br />
mish line, its movements given away by<br />
the snow crackling under foot, took a<br />
number of c<strong>as</strong>ualties and w<strong>as</strong> beaten<br />
back, but it gave some test of the enemy<br />
strength, now estimated to be two rifle<br />
companies and five tanks. Actually most<br />
of the Germans in the 1st Battalion, 60th<br />
Panzer Grenadier Regiment, took part in<br />
the fighting at the pocket or in attempted<br />
infiltration through the woods to join<br />
their comrades t<strong>here</strong>. One such relief<br />
party, led by a tank platoon, did cut its<br />
way in on the morning of the 26th. Now
576 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
that the enemy had been reinforced the<br />
333d Infantry decided to try the artillery,<br />
although not before Colonel Pedley had<br />
been given br<strong>as</strong>s-bound <strong>as</strong>surance that<br />
the gunners would lay their pieces with<br />
such minute precision <strong>as</strong> to miss the<br />
friendly infantry edging the pocket.<br />
Through the rest of the day an 8-inch<br />
howitzer battalion and a battalion of<br />
155’s hammered the target area, intent<br />
on jarring the panzers loose, while a<br />
chemical mortar company tried to burn<br />
them out.<br />
On 27 December patrols edged their<br />
way into the pocket, to find nothing but<br />
abandoned tanks. The previous evening<br />
General Waldenburg heard that the<br />
Fuehrer Begleit Brigade w<strong>as</strong> being taken<br />
away from his right flank and that he<br />
must go over to the defensive at once.<br />
Still in radio contact with the pocket,<br />
Waldenburg ordered the troops t<strong>here</strong> to<br />
come out, synchronizing their move with<br />
an attack at dusk which would be made<br />
toward Ménil, northe<strong>as</strong>t of Verdenne.<br />
Perhaps the feint at Ménil served its<br />
purpose-in any event most of the gren-<br />
adiers made their escape, riding out on<br />
the tanks still capable of movement.<br />
Although this l<strong>as</strong>t sortie against Ménil<br />
w<strong>as</strong> only a ruse, Ménil and the surround-<br />
ing area had been the scene of bitter<br />
fighting and stubborn German attacks<br />
on 26 December. Krueger, the LVIII<br />
Panzer Corps commander, saw in the<br />
newly arrived Fuehrer Begleit an oppor-<br />
tunity to carve the Hotton garrison,<br />
which had been so effectively barring<br />
his advance over the Ourthe, down to<br />
size. The villages of Hotton, Hampteau,<br />
and Ménil form a triangle, Hampteau<br />
being the apex of the triangle, if this is<br />
pictured <strong>as</strong> projecting toward the<br />
German lines. Krueger’s plan w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
sm<strong>as</strong>h through Hampteau, grab the<br />
ridge running back to the west w<strong>here</strong> it<br />
overlooked Hotton and Ménil, and take<br />
Hotton by attack from the rear, that is,<br />
the west bank of the river. Success at<br />
Hotton would permit the 116th Panzer<br />
to peel the American flank back from the<br />
Marche road.<br />
The first contingent from the Fuehrer<br />
Begleit came into the line opposite<br />
Hampteau at noon, deployed, and at<br />
1400 hit Company G of the 334th Infan-<br />
try, which w<strong>as</strong> guarding the Hampteau<br />
bridge site. This attack seems to have<br />
been poorly organized (prisoners said<br />
that the attack formation had been<br />
wrecked in the <strong>as</strong>sembly area by artillery<br />
fire). In any event it crumbled under<br />
the shells of tank destroyers and the 84th<br />
Division artillery. This proved to be the<br />
single pinch-hit performance of the<br />
Fuehrer Begleit, for later in the after-<br />
noon it w<strong>as</strong> ordered out of the line and<br />
sent marching for B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
At 1830 the German attack shifted<br />
toward Ménil, conducted <strong>as</strong> an envelop-<br />
ment on the e<strong>as</strong>t and west by infantry<br />
and tanks of the 116th Panzer. The<br />
western blade of the scissors ran into<br />
trouble when the tanks leading the at-<br />
tacking column were forced off the road<br />
by a daisy-chain of antitank mines. While<br />
attempting to re-form, the tanks were<br />
suddenly <strong>as</strong>sailed by salvo fire from three<br />
field artillery battalions. Six tanks fell<br />
prey to the American cannoneers and the<br />
attack collapsed. Later the enemy made<br />
a demonstration <strong>here</strong> <strong>as</strong> part of Walden-<br />
burg’s feint. On the e<strong>as</strong>t side of the town<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sault had to be made across 500<br />
yards of bare ground. The enemy fusil-<br />
iers bravely attempted the p<strong>as</strong>sage, at-<br />
tempted it several times during the<br />
course of two hours, but unprotected
THE BATTLE BEFORE THE ME<strong>US</strong>E<br />
flesh and blood were no match for the<br />
2,000 rounds of high explosive which<br />
the 326th Field Artillery Battalion<br />
poured down on this killing ground.<br />
By the morning of 27 December the<br />
whole Marche-Hotton front had quieted.<br />
In the enemy lines the crippled and<br />
demoralized 116th Panzer licked its<br />
wounds and dug defensive works while<br />
its neighbor on the left, the XLVII Pan-<br />
zer Corps, retired to a shortened position<br />
in order to free men and tanks for the<br />
577<br />
new fight brewing at B<strong>as</strong>togne. The<br />
84th Infantry Division sent out patrols<br />
and counted its prisoners—592 for the<br />
Verdenne engagement. The entire oper-<br />
ation <strong>as</strong> part of the VII Corps cost the<br />
84th Division 112 killed, 122 missing,<br />
and 348 wounded. On New Year’s Day<br />
the 84th w<strong>as</strong> relieved by the British 53d<br />
Division and moved north, prepared to<br />
team once again with the 2d Armored<br />
Division–but this time for the offensive.
CHAPTER XXIII<br />
The Battle Between the Salm<br />
and the Ourthe<br />
24 December - 2 January<br />
The Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> had begun the<br />
Ardennes counteroffensive with two dis-<br />
tinct missions in hand: the first, to cross<br />
the Meuse River between Liège and<br />
Huy <strong>as</strong> a prelude to the seizure of Ant-<br />
werp; the second, to wheel a cordon of<br />
divisions onto a blocking line extending<br />
due e<strong>as</strong>t of Liège to cover the depth of<br />
the advancing army and to deny incom-<br />
ing Allied reinforcements the use of the<br />
highway complex southe<strong>as</strong>t of Liège.<br />
Constricted by the American grip on the<br />
Elsenborn Ridge “door post” (<strong>as</strong> the<br />
German High Command called this PO-<br />
sition), the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> had<br />
bumped and jostled some of its divisions<br />
p<strong>as</strong>t Elsenborn and on toward the west,<br />
but had failed to achieve the momentum<br />
and maneuver room requisite to the <strong>as</strong>-<br />
signed missions. The armored gallop for<br />
the Meuse had foundered on the north<br />
bank of the Amblève River when Pei-<br />
per’s mobile t<strong>as</strong>k force from the 1st SS<br />
Panzer Division had run squarely against<br />
the 30th Infantry Division. The 12th SS<br />
Panzer Division, supposed originally to<br />
be running mate with the 1st SS Panzer,<br />
had become involved in a costly and<br />
time-consuming fight to budge the Amer-<br />
ican “door post,” failing t<strong>here</strong>by to keep<br />
its place in the German scheme of ma-<br />
neuver. T<strong>here</strong>fore, the t<strong>as</strong>k-and glory<br />
–of leading the drive across the Meuse<br />
had p<strong>as</strong>sed to the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
But General Sepp Dietrich’s SS forma-<br />
tions had failed quite <strong>as</strong> signally to<br />
achieve the second mission-to create the<br />
blocking line e<strong>as</strong>t of Liège. Left free to<br />
deploy along the proliferating highway<br />
system southe<strong>as</strong>t of Liège, the Americans<br />
had been able to throw two fresh corps<br />
into defensive array along the Salm, the<br />
Ourthe, the Lesse, and L’Homme Riv-<br />
ers, thus still further obstructing the ad-<br />
vance of the Sixth Panzer and, more im-<br />
portant, endangering the exposed right<br />
flank of the Fifth Panzer <strong>as</strong> it maneu-<br />
vered before the Meuse. (See Map<br />
VIII.)<br />
By 24 December the westernmost<br />
armored columns of the Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> had been slowed to a walk quite<br />
literally, for the OB WEST orders on<br />
that date called for the advance toward<br />
the Meuse “to proceed on foot.” In part<br />
the loss of momentum arose from sup-<br />
ply failure, but b<strong>as</strong>ically the slowing<br />
process stemmed from the failure of the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> to form a protected<br />
corridor for its neighbor to the south
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 579<br />
and so to cover the flank, the rear, and<br />
the line of communications for Man-<br />
teuffel’s salient.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> apparent by the 24th to all of<br />
the higher German commanders that the<br />
advance must be strengthened in depth<br />
and-if possible-enlarged by pushing<br />
out the northern flank on the Marche<br />
plateau. German intelligence sources<br />
now estimated that the Allies were in<br />
the process of bringing a total of four<br />
armored and seven infantry divisions<br />
against the northern flank between the<br />
Salm and Meuse Rivers. The Sixth Pan-<br />
zer <strong>Army</strong> had to transfer its weight to<br />
the west. Hitler, who had been adamant<br />
that Sepp Dietrich should drive the<br />
Americans back from the Elsenborn posi-<br />
tion, finally granted permission on 24<br />
December to give over the battle t<strong>here</strong><br />
and move in second-line divisions ca-<br />
pable only of defensive action. Rund-<br />
stedt already had gone on record that it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> “useless” to keep five divisions in the<br />
Elsenborn sector. Neither Rundstedt nor<br />
Model had completely given up hope<br />
that the point of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
might shake free and start moving again,<br />
for the German successes in the Vielsalm<br />
area at the expense of the American<br />
XVIII Airborne Corps promised much<br />
if Dietrich could reinforce his troops on<br />
this western flank. Nonetheless, the main<br />
play still would be given the Fifth Pan-<br />
zer <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
The orders p<strong>as</strong>sed to Dietrich for 24<br />
December were that his attack forces in<br />
the Salm River sector should push hard<br />
toward the northwest to seize the high<br />
ground extending from the swampy<br />
plateau of the Hohes Venn southwest<br />
across the Ourthe River. In the opinion<br />
of Rundstedt’s staff the Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> at tactical disadvantage be-<br />
cause its westernmost divisions, which<br />
had followed the level path of the Fam-<br />
enne Depression at Marche and Roche-<br />
fort, were under attack from American<br />
forces holding command of the high<br />
ground on the Marche plateau to the<br />
north. It t<strong>here</strong>fore seemed essential for<br />
the Sixth Panzer to establish itself on the<br />
same high ground if it w<strong>as</strong> to relieve the<br />
pressure on Manteuffel’s open and en-<br />
dangered north flank. In theory the<br />
strategic objectives of the Sixth Panzer<br />
were Liège and Eupen, but the German<br />
war diaries show clearly that Rundstedt<br />
(and probably Model) hoped only that<br />
Dietrich could wheel his forward divi-<br />
sions into a good position on defensible<br />
ground from which the Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> could be covered and supported. 1<br />
On the morning of 24 December the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> deployed in an<br />
uneven stairstep line descending south-<br />
west from the boundary with the Fif-<br />
teenth <strong>Army</strong> (near Monschau) to the<br />
Ourthe River, newly designated <strong>as</strong> the<br />
dividing line between the Fifth and<br />
Sixth. In the Monschau-Höfen sector the<br />
LXVII Corps held a north-south line,<br />
the corps’ front then bending at a right<br />
1 Model’s suicide, later in the war, permits in-<br />
terpretations by his superiors and subordinates<br />
which may or may not be in accord with the<br />
facts. Even so, the OB WEST KTB does provide<br />
a re<strong>as</strong>onable guide to Model’s conduct of the<br />
Ardennes operation in these l<strong>as</strong>t days of the<br />
offensive. Also, the OB WEST/IC-Tagesmeldungen<br />
reveal what information on the Allied dispositions<br />
and intentions w<strong>as</strong> available to Model. A further<br />
check is provided by a series of postwar interro-<br />
gations involving Rundstedt and Jodl. For the<br />
former see CSDIC (U.K.) # GRGG330, SRGG<br />
1332 and SRGG 1334 (these interrogations date<br />
from July and August 1945). Jodl w<strong>as</strong> interro-<br />
gated by the <strong>US</strong>FET Historical Division before<br />
his execution: MS ETHINT–51 (Jodl). See also<br />
the testimony of Jodl’s aide in MS ETHINT–34<br />
(Buecks) .
580 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
angle p<strong>as</strong>t the Elsenborn ridge line. This<br />
corps front coincided almost exactly with<br />
that of the American V Corps. The I SS<br />
Panzer Corps continued the German line<br />
west along the Amblève River w<strong>here</strong><br />
it faced the reinforced 30th Infantry<br />
Division, but at the juncture of the<br />
Amblève and the Salm the line bent<br />
south at a sharp angle, following the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
bank of the latter river <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Vielsalm.<br />
This section of the German line opposite<br />
the 82d Airborne Division w<strong>as</strong> poorly<br />
manned. The 1st SS Panzer Division<br />
(the only division available to the<br />
corps) had put troops across both the<br />
Amblève and Salm, but by the 24th the<br />
1st SS, already badly beaten, w<strong>as</strong> able to<br />
do little more than patrol its corner<br />
position.<br />
The fall of St. Vith had opened the<br />
way for the westernmost corps of the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> to form a b<strong>as</strong>e of<br />
attack running generally west from Viel-<br />
salm and the Salm River to the cross-<br />
roads at Baraque de Fraiture (Parker’s<br />
Crossroads). This corps, the II SS Pan-<br />
zer, had relieved the 560th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division of its attack against the<br />
south front of the 82d Airborne and 3d<br />
Armored Divisions, the 560th sideslip-<br />
ping further west to take over the front,<br />
facing elements of the 3d Armored Divi-<br />
sion between the Aisne and Ourthe<br />
Rivers. The diagonal course of the Our-<br />
the valley and the broken nature of the<br />
ground lying e<strong>as</strong>t of it posed an organ-<br />
ization and command problem for both<br />
Germans and Americans. Those ele-<br />
ments of the 3d Armored e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
Ourthe, though belonging to Collins’<br />
VII Corps, were actors in the story of<br />
the XVIII Airborne Corps. The same<br />
lack of neat accord between battle roles<br />
and order of battle listings w<strong>as</strong> reflected<br />
on the German side of the line. T<strong>here</strong><br />
the LVIII Panzer Corps, forming the<br />
right wing tip of the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>,<br />
lay <strong>as</strong>tride the Ourthe with its armor<br />
(the 116th Panzer) on the west bank<br />
and the bulk of its infantry (the 560th<br />
Yolks Grenadier Division) on the e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
bank, echeloned in front of the incoming<br />
II SS Panzer Corps.<br />
When, on the night of 22 December,<br />
the advance guard of Bittrich’s II SS<br />
Panzer Corps first descended on the<br />
American-held crossroads at Baraque de<br />
Fraiture, General Bittrich had only one<br />
regiment of the 2d SS Panzer Division<br />
available for mounting this new Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> attack. On 23 December,<br />
when the Americans at the crossroads<br />
finally succumbed to superior numbers,<br />
Bittrich had nearly all of the 2d SS at his<br />
disposal and the advance guard of his<br />
9th SS Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong> nearing the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t bank of the Salm. Field Marshal<br />
Model had just wheeled the two infantry<br />
divisions of the LXVI Corps northward<br />
with orders to attack <strong>as</strong>tride the Salm<br />
valley, thus bolstering Bittrich’s right<br />
flank, now insecurely held by the deci-<br />
mated 1st SS Panzer Division.<br />
General Bittrich had been promised<br />
still more forces for his attack to the<br />
northwest. The Fuehrer Begleit Brigade,<br />
re-forming after its battles in the St. Vith<br />
sector, w<strong>as</strong> en route to join the 2d SS<br />
Panzer at the Baraque de Fraiture cross-<br />
roads. The 12th SS Panzer Division, so<br />
Bittrich w<strong>as</strong> told, would be relieved in<br />
the Elsenborn sector and hurried to the<br />
new Sixth Panzer front. Finally, Hitler<br />
himself would order the 3d Panzer Gren-<br />
adier Division moved from the Elsen-<br />
born battle to the fight looming between<br />
the Salm and the Ourthe. Bittrich h<strong>as</strong><br />
not recorded any gloomy suspicion of
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 581<br />
this potential plethora of riches, but <strong>as</strong><br />
a veteran commander he no doubt rec-<br />
ognized the many slips possible between<br />
cup and lip: the incre<strong>as</strong>ing poverty of<br />
POL, Allied air strikes against any and<br />
all moving columns, the poor state of<br />
the few roads leading back through the<br />
narrow Sixth Panzer zone of communi-<br />
cations, and, finally, the pressing and<br />
probably overriding demands of the<br />
Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> with one foot en-<br />
tangled at B<strong>as</strong>togne and the other poised<br />
only a few miles from the Meuse.<br />
The German attack plans, formulated<br />
during the night of 23 December <strong>as</strong> the<br />
2d SS Panzer mopped up the l<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
defenders around the Baraque de Frait-<br />
ure crossroads, called for a continuation<br />
of the 2d SS Panzer attack northwest,<br />
<strong>as</strong>tride the Liège highway on the 24th.<br />
The immediate objective w<strong>as</strong> the Man-<br />
hay crossroads five miles away. Once at<br />
Manhay the attack could either peel off<br />
along the road west to Hotton, t<strong>here</strong><br />
freeing the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> forma-<br />
tions hung up at the Hotton-Marche<br />
road, or swing northwest to gain the<br />
main Ourthe bridge site at Durbuy. The<br />
II SS Panzer Corps attack b<strong>as</strong>e on the<br />
Salmchâteau-La Roche road seemed se-<br />
cure enough. On the left the 560th had<br />
driven a salient clear to Soy, a distance<br />
of eleven miles. On the right American<br />
stragglers from St. Vith were fighting to<br />
escape northward through or around<br />
Salmchâteau. The 82d Airborne Divi-<br />
sion still had an outpost line covering<br />
much of the road west of Salmchâteau,<br />
but the Fuehrer Begleit Brigade w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
position to roll back the Americans in<br />
this sector. In any c<strong>as</strong>e the 9th SS Panzer<br />
Division would, in a matter of hours,<br />
cross the Salm River in the Vielsalm-<br />
Salmchâteau area and swing northwest<br />
to march forward at the right shoulder<br />
of the 2d SS Panzer. This w<strong>as</strong> the out-<br />
line plan for 24 December.<br />
On the morning of 24 December the<br />
American troops between the Salm and<br />
Ourthe Rivers were deployed on a front,<br />
if so it can be called, of over thirty miles.<br />
This, of course, w<strong>as</strong> no flankless and<br />
integrated position. On the west wing in<br />
particular the American line consisted of<br />
small t<strong>as</strong>k forces from the 3d Armored,<br />
each defending or attacking a hill or<br />
hamlet in what were almost independent<br />
operations. In the Salm sector the 82d<br />
Airborne Division faced north, e<strong>as</strong>t, and<br />
south, this disposition reflecting the<br />
topsy-turvy condition encountered when<br />
the division first came in to cover the<br />
deployment of the XVIII Airborne<br />
Corps. The 504th Parachute Infantry<br />
(Cor. Reuben H. Tucker), on the divi-<br />
sion north flank, w<strong>as</strong> bent at an angle<br />
reaching west and south from the con-<br />
fluence of the Amblève and Salm Rivers,<br />
a position <strong>as</strong>sumed while Kampfgruppe<br />
Peiper w<strong>as</strong> on the rampage west of<br />
Stavelot. The 505th Parachute Infantry<br />
(Col. William E. Ekman) over-watched<br />
the Salm from positions on the west<br />
bank extending from Trois Ponts south<br />
p<strong>as</strong>t Grand Halleux. The 508th Para-<br />
chute Infantry (Col. Roy E. Lindquist)<br />
held a series of bluffs and ridges which<br />
faced the bridge sites at Vielsalm and<br />
Salmchâteau, then extended westward<br />
overlooking the La Roche highway. The<br />
325th Glider Infantry (Col. Charles<br />
Billingslea) held the division right flank<br />
and continued the westward line along<br />
the ridges looking down on the La Roche<br />
road; its wing w<strong>as</strong> affixed to the village<br />
of Fraiture just northe<strong>as</strong>t of the cross-<br />
roads w<strong>here</strong> the 2d SS Panzer had begun
582 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
its penetration.<br />
From Fraiture west to the Ourthe the<br />
American “line” w<strong>as</strong> difficult to trace.<br />
Here elements of the 3d Armored Divi-<br />
sion and two parachute infantry battal-<br />
ions were attempting to hold an exten-<br />
sion of the American line west of<br />
Baraque de Fraiture, none too solidly<br />
anchored at Lamorménil and Freyneux. 2<br />
At the same time the Americans’ exposed<br />
right wing w<strong>as</strong> counterattacking to er<strong>as</strong>e<br />
2 The term “elements of the 3d Armored Divi-<br />
sion” is used advisedly for CCB w<strong>as</strong> operating<br />
with the 30th Division in the La Gleize sector,<br />
while T<strong>as</strong>k Force Doan (Lt. Col. Leander L. Doan)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> with the 84th Division west of the Ourthe.<br />
For the preceding action of these elements, see<br />
Chapter XXII.<br />
the German penetration which had<br />
driven <strong>as</strong> far north <strong>as</strong> the Soy-Hotton<br />
road and threatened to engulf T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Orr, standing alone and vulner-<br />
able at Amonines on the west bank of<br />
the Aisne River. Two regimental com-<br />
bat teams from the <strong>as</strong> yet untried 75th<br />
Infantry Division were en route to help<br />
shore up the ragged 3d Armored (–)<br />
front but probably would not reach Gen-<br />
eral Rose until the evening of the 24th.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> were some additional troops<br />
immediately at hand to throw in against<br />
the II SS Panzer Corps. All through the<br />
afternoon and evening of the 23d the<br />
St. Vith defenders poured through the<br />
American lines. When the l<strong>as</strong>t column,<br />
PRIME MOVER TOWING AN 8-INCH HOWITZER ALONG A ROAD NEAR MANHAY
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 583<br />
led by Colonel Nelson of the 112th In-<br />
fantry, reached the paratroopers, some<br />
15,000 men and about a hundred usable<br />
tanks had been added to Ridgway’s force<br />
west of the Salm. Aware of the incre<strong>as</strong>ing<br />
enemy strength south of Manhay, Gen-<br />
eral Ridgway sent troops of the 7th<br />
Armored and the remnants of the 106th<br />
Division to extend and reinforce the<br />
right flank of the 82d Airborne. At the<br />
same time, he ordered CCB, 9th Ar-<br />
mored, to <strong>as</strong>semble <strong>as</strong> a mobile reserve<br />
around Malempré, e<strong>as</strong>t of the Manhay<br />
road, and to back up the American<br />
blocking position just north of the Bara-<br />
que de Fraiture. Ridgway, however,<br />
recognized that the 7th Armored w<strong>as</strong><br />
much below strength and that the<br />
rugged, forested terrain on his front w<strong>as</strong><br />
poor for armor; so, on 24 December, he<br />
<strong>as</strong>ked Hodges to give him an infantry<br />
division.<br />
The Battle at the Manhay<br />
Crossroads<br />
By dawn on 24 December General-<br />
leutnant Heinz Lammerding, comman-<br />
der of the 2d SS Panzer, had brought his<br />
two armored infantry regiments into<br />
line north of the Baraque de Fraiture<br />
crossroads. The zone on the west side of<br />
the road to Manhay w<strong>as</strong> given over to<br />
the 3d Panzer Grenadier, that e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
the road to the 4th Panzer Grenadier.<br />
Both groups possessed small panzer de-<br />
tachments, but the bulk of Lammer-<br />
ding’s tanks were left bivouacked in<br />
wood lots to the rear. The terrain ahead<br />
w<strong>as</strong> tactically negotiable only by small<br />
packets of armor, and in the p<strong>as</strong>t twenty-<br />
four hours the amount of POL reaching<br />
the westernmost German columns had<br />
been gravely reduced. Lammerding had<br />
to husband his fuel for a short, direct<br />
thrust.<br />
The <strong>as</strong>sault, however, w<strong>as</strong> initiated by<br />
the right wing of the 560th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division, which had provided the<br />
cover for the 2d SS Panzer <strong>as</strong>sembly.<br />
During the previous night the 1130th<br />
Regiment, now reduced to fewer than<br />
500 men, had slipped between the 3d<br />
Armored outposts manned by T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Kane at Odeigne and Freyneux.<br />
The American outpost in Odeigne hav-<br />
ing been withdrawn, a German <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
gun platoon supported by a company or<br />
two of grenadiers moved into the open<br />
to attack Freyneux. About a dozen Amer-<br />
ican tanks, half of them light, remained<br />
quiet in their camouflaged positions in-<br />
side Freyneux. The German infantry en-<br />
tered the village while the <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
closed in to give support; this w<strong>as</strong> what<br />
the short-barreled Shermans needed.<br />
They destroyed or crippled over half<br />
the guns, an American tank destroyer<br />
shelled the enemy infantry out of the<br />
houses, and the skirmish abruptly ended.<br />
A second German force meanwhile<br />
had made a p<strong>as</strong>s at the third of Kane’s<br />
roadblock positions <strong>here</strong> in the valley,<br />
Lamorménil, just west of Freyneux. In<br />
this c<strong>as</strong>e the enemy first perched up on<br />
the heights, trying to soften the Amer-<br />
ican detachment with long-range <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault gun fire, but when the guns moved<br />
down into the village for the kill the<br />
American tankers promptly knocked out<br />
the leaders. At twilight further enemy<br />
adventures in this sector were abandoned<br />
since the possession of Odeigne opened<br />
the way for a flanking thrust at the Man-<br />
hay crossroads and the seizure of Grand-<br />
ménil on the road to Hotton and the<br />
Ourthe. In any c<strong>as</strong>e the 1130th had sus-<br />
tained such severe losses during the day
584 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
that it w<strong>as</strong> temporarily out of action.<br />
Kane’s t<strong>as</strong>k force w<strong>as</strong> not hit again and<br />
withdrew to the north under cover of<br />
fog and artificial smoke on the 26th.<br />
It will be recalled that T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Brewster had established a roadblock<br />
position athwart the Manhay road late<br />
on the 23d. During the night German<br />
infantry had filtered into and through<br />
the surrounding woods, taking posses-<br />
sion of Odeigne—only 1,200 yards to the<br />
west–in the process, but Brewster’s tanks<br />
and guns were deployed with enough in-<br />
fantry to hold the enemy riflemen at<br />
arm’s length. For any one of a number<br />
of re<strong>as</strong>ons General Lammerding did not<br />
essay a tank <strong>as</strong>sault in force to oust Brew-<br />
ster from the highway. The Americans<br />
in part were m<strong>as</strong>ked from direct obser-<br />
vation, the ground w<strong>as</strong> poor, the Ger-<br />
man main force needed a wider corri-<br />
dor than possession of twenty-two feet<br />
MANHAY CROSSROADS<br />
of pavement would provide, the Amer-<br />
ican fighter-bombers were exceedingly<br />
busy–whatever his re<strong>as</strong>on Lammerding<br />
did no more during the morning than<br />
to probe at Brewster’s position while<br />
waiting for elbow room to be won a<br />
mile or two on either side of the<br />
highway.<br />
Remer’s Fuehrer Begleit Brigade,<br />
which had the t<strong>as</strong>k of driving the Amer-<br />
icans back and giving free play to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t wing of the 2d SS Panzer, moved<br />
up p<strong>as</strong>t Salmchâteau in the early morn-<br />
ing and struck through the village of<br />
Regné, w<strong>here</strong> a platoon of paratroopers<br />
and three 57-mm. antitank guns proved<br />
no match for the panzers. Possession of<br />
Regné opened the way into the Lienne<br />
River valley, thus endangering the 82d<br />
Airborne flank and line of supply. More<br />
immediately, the German coup de main<br />
at Regné opened the way for the 4th
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 585<br />
Panzer Grenadier to initiate a pincers<br />
attack against the 2d Battalion of the<br />
325th Glider Infantry at Fraiture, the<br />
western corner post of the 82d Airborne<br />
defenses. Hard on the heels of the Ger-<br />
man infantry, the point of the Fuehrer<br />
Begleit swung to take a hand against<br />
Fraiture. Here the 2d Battalion, “tired<br />
of attempting to stop armor with tired<br />
men and thin air,” received permission<br />
about noon to withdraw a half-mile to<br />
the northe<strong>as</strong>t. The battalion fell back<br />
with almost no loss, although it had to<br />
take on one of the flanking detachments<br />
from the 4th Panzer Grenadier en route.<br />
While this rear guard action w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
progress, the reserve company of the<br />
325th and a medium tank company from<br />
the 14th Tank Battalion counter-<br />
attacked at Regné and wrested it from<br />
the tank detachment left t<strong>here</strong> by Re-<br />
mer. This village no longer had a place<br />
in the Fuehrer Begleit scheme. The bri-<br />
gade w<strong>as</strong> shifting to Fraiture, and even<br />
before its columns could close new or-<br />
ders arrived from Marshal Model which<br />
would send Remer and his panzers<br />
hurrying posth<strong>as</strong>te to join the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> farther west.<br />
During the morning of the 24th a se-<br />
ries of somewhat un-co-ordinated and<br />
disconnected steps had been taken by the<br />
American commanders facing the threat<br />
posed by the II SS Panzer Corps. Gen-<br />
eral Ridgway had no direct authority<br />
over the 3d Armored Division troops,<br />
who belonged to the VII Corps, and the<br />
units which had just come out of the<br />
St. Vith salient were scattered hither<br />
and yon without much regard to tactical<br />
unity or proper integration in the wire<br />
and radio command net earlier estab-<br />
lished for the XVIII Corps formations<br />
west of the Salm. On the night of the<br />
23d Ridgway had ordered H<strong>as</strong>brouck to<br />
collect a force from the 7th Armored<br />
sufficient to hold the Manhay junction<br />
and to tie this force to the 82d Airborne<br />
positions. H<strong>as</strong>brouck selected Colonel<br />
Rosebaum’s CCA, which had come<br />
through the withdrawal from St. Vith<br />
in fair shape. The first part of the 7th<br />
Armored mission w<strong>as</strong> carried out in the<br />
early morning of the 24th when a t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force outposted Manhay and its radial<br />
roads, but a reconnaissance detachment<br />
sent southe<strong>as</strong>t to contact the 82d Air-<br />
borne w<strong>as</strong> halted by a blown bridge.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remained a gap, t<strong>here</strong>fore, be-<br />
tween the 7th Armored advance t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force, which w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembling at noon in<br />
the vicinity of Malempré, southe<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Manhay, and the new 82d Airborne<br />
flank being formed north of Fraiture.<br />
On the west wing co-ordination be-<br />
tween the 7th Armored and the 3d Ar-<br />
mored t<strong>as</strong>k forces would prove to be<br />
very complicated indeed. That portion<br />
of General Rose’s division e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
Ourthe River by now w<strong>as</strong> fighting two<br />
separate battles, one in the Hotton-Soy<br />
sector w<strong>here</strong> the 560th Volks Grenadier<br />
penetration had occurred, and the other<br />
along the series of blocking positions<br />
that reached from T<strong>as</strong>k Force Brewster’s<br />
handhold on the Manhay road, through<br />
Freyneux and Lamorménil, and north-<br />
west to Orr’s position at Amonines on<br />
the Aisne River. <strong>To</strong> give cohesion to the<br />
3d Armored defensive battle e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the Aisne, General Rose recalled<br />
Brig. Gen. Doyle Hickey, his CCA<br />
commander, from the 84th Divi-<br />
sion sector and placed him in command<br />
t<strong>here</strong>. Early in the afternoon Hickey<br />
met Colonel Rosebaum, who had just<br />
brought the main force of CCA, 7th<br />
Armored Division, into Manhay, and
586<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
ELEMENTS OF THE 3D ARMORED DIION ADVANCING NEAR MANHAY<br />
the two worked out a plan to co-ordinate<br />
the efforts of their respective commands.<br />
The 7th Armored troops would deploy<br />
on the high ground south of Manhay and<br />
extend their line across the highway<br />
and along the ridge leading e<strong>as</strong>t to Ma-<br />
lempré. T<strong>here</strong>after T<strong>as</strong>k Force Brew-<br />
ster would attempt to withdraw from<br />
its beleaguered roadblock position, re-<br />
tire through the 7th Armored line, and<br />
swing westward to bolster the 3d Ar-<br />
mored outposts in the Lamorménil-Frey-<br />
neux sector.<br />
Colonel Rosebaum’s command took<br />
the rest of the daylight hours to carry<br />
out the planned deployment, but be-<br />
fore T<strong>as</strong>k Force Brewster could begin<br />
its retirement new orders arrived from<br />
the XVIII Airborne Corps. Field Mar-<br />
shal Montgomery had visited Ridgway’s<br />
headquarters in midmorning and had<br />
decided at once that the American front<br />
between the Ourthe and the Salm w<strong>as</strong><br />
too full of holes and overextended. 3 Fur-<br />
thermore he w<strong>as</strong> concerned with the in-<br />
cre<strong>as</strong>ing German pressure on the west-<br />
ern flank of the First <strong>Army</strong> <strong>as</strong> this w<strong>as</strong><br />
represented by movement against the<br />
3 See Msg, Montgomery to Eisenhower, 25 Dec<br />
44, SHAEF Msg file. Montgomery appears to have<br />
been kept fully apprised of the Manhay fight by<br />
the Phantom service. See Hills, Phantom W<strong>as</strong><br />
T<strong>here</strong>. See also Sylvan Diary and XVIII Airborne<br />
Corps G–3 Jnl.
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 587<br />
VII Corps flank at Ciney. He told the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> commander, t<strong>here</strong>fore, that<br />
the XVIII Airborne Corps must be with-<br />
drawn to a shorter, straighter line and<br />
that the VII Corps could be rele<strong>as</strong>ed<br />
from “all offensive missions.” General<br />
Collins might, on his own volition, draw<br />
the left wing of the VII Corps back on<br />
the line Hotton-Manhay, conforming to<br />
Ridgway’s regroupment. 4<br />
The American line to be formed dur-<br />
ing the night of 24 December w<strong>as</strong> in-<br />
tended to have a new look. The 82d<br />
Airborne would pull back to a much<br />
shorter front extending diagonally from<br />
Trois Ponts southwest to Vaux Chav-<br />
anne, just short of Manhay. CCA of the<br />
7th Armored would withdraw to the<br />
low hills north of Manhay and Grand-<br />
ménil (although Colonel Rosebaum pro-<br />
tested that the high ground now occu-<br />
pied by his command south and south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Manhay w<strong>as</strong> tactically superior)<br />
and retain a combat outpost in the valley<br />
at Manhay itself. The 3d Armored t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
forces had been promised support in the<br />
form of the 289th Infantry, due to ar-<br />
rive on Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve; so Hickey<br />
mapped his new position to rest on the<br />
Aisne River with its e<strong>as</strong>t flank tied to<br />
Grandménil and its west resting on<br />
Amonines. Since the 289th, a green reg-<br />
iment, would be put into an attack on<br />
the morning of the 25th to clear the<br />
Germans out of the woods near Grand-<br />
ménil, Hickey decided that T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Kane would have to remain in its<br />
covering position at Freyneux and<br />
Lamorménil while the 289th <strong>as</strong>sembled,<br />
and that T<strong>as</strong>k Force Brewster—thus far<br />
exposed only to desultory attack-would<br />
have to hold on at the Manhay road<br />
4 Collins’ decision is described in Chapter XXII.<br />
until the 7th Armored had redressed<br />
its lines.<br />
A glance at the map will show how<br />
difficult the series of American maneu-<br />
vers begun on Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve would be<br />
and how tricky to co-ordinate, particu-<br />
larly in the Manhay sector. Yet it w<strong>as</strong><br />
precisely in this part of the front that<br />
communications had not been thorough-<br />
ly established and that tactical cohesion<br />
had not <strong>as</strong> yet been secured. As shown<br />
by later events, communication be-<br />
tween the 3d Armored and the 7th Ar-<br />
mored commanders and staffs failed<br />
miserably. T<strong>here</strong> had been so many re-<br />
visions of plans, orders, and counteror-<br />
ders during the 24th that Colonel Rose-<br />
baum did not receive word of his new<br />
retrograde mission until 1800. The with-<br />
drawal of CCA, 7th Armored, and the<br />
elements of CCB, 9th Armored, south<br />
and southe<strong>as</strong>t of Manhay w<strong>as</strong> scheduled<br />
to begin at 2230-and most of these<br />
troops and parts of the 3d Armored<br />
would have to p<strong>as</strong>s through Manhay.<br />
<strong>To</strong>ward Manhay, on the night of 24<br />
December, the main body of the 2d SS<br />
Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong> moving. The sei-<br />
zure of Odeigne the night before had<br />
opened a narrow sally port facing<br />
Grandménil and Manhay, but t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
no road capable of handling a large<br />
armored column between Odeigne and<br />
the 2d SS Panzer <strong>as</strong>sembly are<strong>as</strong><br />
south of the Baraque de Fraiture. On<br />
the 24th the commander of the 3d Pan-<br />
zer Grenadier Regiment secured Gen-<br />
eral Lammerding’s approval to postpone<br />
a further advance until the German en-<br />
gineers could build a road through the<br />
woods to Odeigne. By nightfall on<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve this road w<strong>as</strong> ready-and<br />
the Allied fighter-bombers had returned<br />
to their b<strong>as</strong>es. The 3d Panzer Gren-
588 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
TROOPS OF THE 84TH INFANTRY DIVISION DIGGIG IN<br />
adier now gat<strong>here</strong>d in attack formation<br />
in the woods around Odeigne, while<br />
tanks of the 2d Panzer Regiment formed<br />
in column along the new road, <strong>To</strong><br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t the 4th Panzer Grenadier sent<br />
a rifle battalion moving quietly from<br />
Fraiture through the woods toward Ma-<br />
lempré. By 2100, the hour set for the<br />
German attack, the column at Odeigne<br />
w<strong>as</strong> ready. Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve had brought<br />
a beautifully clear moonlit night, the<br />
glistening snow w<strong>as</strong> hard-packed, tank-<br />
going good.<br />
About the time the German column<br />
started forward, the subordinate com-<br />
manders of CCA, 7th Armored, received<br />
word by radio to report in Manhay,<br />
t<strong>here</strong> to be given new orders-the orders,<br />
that is, for the general withdrawal north.<br />
The commander of the 7th Armored<br />
position north of Odeigne (held by a<br />
company of the 40th Tank Battalion<br />
and a company of the 48th Armored In-<br />
fantry Battalion) had just started for<br />
Manhay when he saw a tank column<br />
coming up the road toward his position.<br />
A call to battalion headquarters failed to<br />
identify these tanks, but since the leader<br />
showed the typical blue exhaust of the<br />
Sherman, it w<strong>as</strong> decided that this must<br />
be a detachment from the 3d Armored.<br />
Suddenly a German bazooka bl<strong>as</strong>ted
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 589<br />
from the woods w<strong>here</strong> the Americans<br />
were deployed; German infantry had<br />
crept in close to the American tanks<br />
and their covering infantry. Four of<br />
the Shermans fell to the enemy bazooka<br />
men in short order and two were crip-<br />
pled, but the crippled tanks and one<br />
still intact managed to wheel about and<br />
head for Manhay. The armored infantry<br />
company <strong>as</strong>ked for permission to with-<br />
draw, got no answer, and finally broke-<br />
the survivors turning toward Manhay.<br />
A thousand yards or so farther north<br />
stood another 7th Armored roadblock,<br />
defended by an understrength rifle com-<br />
pany and ten medium tanks which had<br />
been dug in to give hull defilade.<br />
Again the Americans were deceived by<br />
the Jud<strong>as</strong> Goat Sherman leading the en-<br />
emy column. When almost upon the im-<br />
mobile American tanks the Germans cut<br />
loose with flares. Blinded and unable<br />
to move, the ten Shermans were so many<br />
sitting ducks; most were hit by tank<br />
fire and all were evacuated by their<br />
crews. The American infantry in turn<br />
fell prey to the grenadiers moving<br />
through the woods bordering the road<br />
and fell back in small groups toward<br />
Manhay.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> now a little after 2230, the<br />
hour set for the 7th Armored move to<br />
the new position north of Manhay. The<br />
covering elements of the 3d Armored<br />
had already withdrawn, but without<br />
notifying CCA of the 7th. 5 The light<br />
tank detachment from Malempré had<br />
left that village (the grenadier battal-<br />
ion from the 4th Regiment moving in<br />
5 This failure is confirmed in the XVIII Air-<br />
borne Corps Inspector General Report of Investi-<br />
gation, CCA, 7th Armored, Manhay, 24–25<br />
December 1944, dated 6 January 1945.<br />
on the tankers’ heels), the support eche-<br />
lon of CCB, 9th Armored, already had<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed through Manhay, and the head-<br />
quarters column of CCA, 7th Armored,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> just on its way out of Manhay when<br />
the American tanks that had escaped<br />
from the first roadblock position burst<br />
into the latter village. Thus far the<br />
headquarters in Manhay knew nothing<br />
of the German advance–although a<br />
quarter of an hour earlier the enemy<br />
gunners had shelled the village. A pla-<br />
toon commander attempted to get two<br />
of his medium tanks into firing posi-<br />
tion at the crossroads itself, but the<br />
situation quickly degenerated into a<br />
suave qui peut when the leading pan-<br />
zers stuck their snouts into Manhay.<br />
In a l<strong>as</strong>t exchange of shots the Amer-<br />
icans accounted for two of the panzers<br />
but lost five of their own tanks at the<br />
rear of the CCA column. Thus Manhay<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed into German hands.<br />
The medium tanks and armored in-<br />
fantry that had started to follow the<br />
light tank detachment out of Malempré<br />
circled around Manhay when they<br />
heard the firing. Working their way<br />
north, the road-bound tanks ended up<br />
at Werbomont while the riflemen moved<br />
cross-country to reach friendly lines<br />
about two thousand yards north of Man-<br />
hay. T<strong>here</strong> Colonel Rhea, commanding<br />
the 23d Armored Infantry Battalion,<br />
had formed a defense on the hills bor-<br />
dering the highway to Werbomont and<br />
Liège. All this while Major Brewster<br />
and the t<strong>as</strong>k force <strong>as</strong>tride the highway<br />
south of Manhay had been under fire,<br />
but the enemy had refused to close for<br />
a final <strong>as</strong>sault. It soon became apparent,<br />
however, that this small American<br />
force w<strong>as</strong> on its own and that the Ger-<br />
mans were in strength to the rear. Brew-
590<br />
ster radioed for permission to pull out;<br />
when it w<strong>as</strong> granted he turned e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
toward Malempré, hoping to find this<br />
spot still in friendly hands. The Ger-<br />
man battalion which had come up from<br />
Fraiture met Brewster’s column at Ma-<br />
lempré and shot out his two lead tanks.<br />
Since t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no other road, Brew-<br />
ster ordered his vehicles abandoned and<br />
rele<strong>as</strong>ed his men to reach the American<br />
lines on their own–most of his com-<br />
mand made it.<br />
Although the 2d SS Panzer had pre-<br />
empted a piece of the new American<br />
line, General Lammerding w<strong>as</strong> none too<br />
ple<strong>as</strong>ed by the results of the Christm<strong>as</strong><br />
Eve attack. His tanks had bitten only<br />
a small piece from the tail of the “long<br />
American column” reported fleeing<br />
Manhay. (Their inability to do better<br />
his officers <strong>as</strong>cribed to the difficulty at-<br />
tendant on bringing more than one or<br />
two tanks into firing position on the nar-<br />
row roads.) The accompanying infan-<br />
try formations had failed to co-ordinate<br />
their advance with that of the armored<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault from Odeigne and to seize, <strong>as</strong><br />
planned, the wooded heights northwest<br />
of Manhay and Grandménil. Lammerd-<br />
ing and the II SS Panzer Corps com-<br />
mander, General Bittrich, agreed that<br />
the 1st SS Panzer should continue the<br />
battle with shock tactics aimed at secur-<br />
ing an enlarged maneuver space e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
and west of Manhay. The 9th SS Panzer<br />
(which had crossed the Salm River be-<br />
hind the withdrawing 82d Airborne)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to align itself <strong>as</strong> rapidly <strong>as</strong> might<br />
be with Lammerding’s division in an<br />
advance up the Lienne valley toward<br />
Br<strong>as</strong>, commanding the high ground<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t of Manhay.<br />
The fall of Manhay roused consider-<br />
able apprehension in the American<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
headquarters. General Ridgway saw that<br />
his new corps defense might be split<br />
in the center before it could properly<br />
solidify. General Hodges sent message<br />
after message to the XVIII Airborne<br />
Corps insisting that Manhay must be<br />
retaken, for it w<strong>as</strong> all too clear that<br />
if the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> could rein-<br />
force the Manhay salient, Liège and<br />
the Meuse bridgehead would be in grave<br />
danger. 6 In addition, he pressed Field<br />
Marshal Montgomery for more divisions<br />
to backstop the threatened sector be-<br />
tween the Salm and the Ourthe.<br />
By daylight on the 25th Colonel Rhea<br />
had am<strong>as</strong>sed a sizable force on the hills<br />
north of Manhay, his own armored in-<br />
fantry battalion, reinforced by the 2d<br />
Battalion of the 424th Infantry, plus<br />
the tanks and stragglers that had worked<br />
their way p<strong>as</strong>t the enemy in Manhay.<br />
The Germans scouted this position,<br />
then broke contact–probably discour-<br />
aged by twelve P–47’s from the 389th<br />
Squadron who claimed ten tank kills<br />
on this mission. <strong>To</strong> the e<strong>as</strong>t General<br />
Gavin sent the 1st Battalion of Billings-<br />
lea’s glider infantry to secure his divi-<br />
sion’s right flank at Tri-le-Cheslaing,<br />
a tiny collection of houses in the valley<br />
about 2,000 yards e<strong>as</strong>t of Manhay. For<br />
some re<strong>as</strong>on, perhaps the lack of co-or-<br />
dination which had bot<strong>here</strong>d Lammer-<br />
ding, the 4th Panzer Grenadier had<br />
not pushed forward and the village w<strong>as</strong><br />
unoccupied. Thus far the 82d Airborne<br />
had had no physical contact with CCA<br />
of the 7th Armored, but Gavin w<strong>as</strong><br />
apprised by radio that his western neigh-<br />
bor w<strong>as</strong> in position on the Werbomont-<br />
Liège highway.<br />
6 Sylvan Diary; XVIII Airborne G–3 Jnl, 25<br />
Dec 44.
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 591<br />
General Bittrich had no intention of<br />
pushing the 2d SS Panzer north toward<br />
Liège. Although the time at which the<br />
II SS Panzer Corps commander received<br />
his orders is uncertain, it is known<br />
that by the small hours of 25 December<br />
Bittrich w<strong>as</strong> embarked on a new mis-<br />
sion <strong>as</strong>signed by General Kraemer, the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> chief of staff. The<br />
2d SS Panzer now w<strong>as</strong> to turn west<br />
from Manhay, drive along the lateral<br />
road to Erezée on the Aisne River,<br />
then pivot northwest to seize the Ourthe<br />
bridgehead at Durbuy, all this <strong>as</strong> a ma-<br />
neuver to strike the American VII<br />
Corps in the flank and break the dead-<br />
ly ,gr<strong>as</strong>p Collins and Harmon had on the<br />
throat of the Fifth Panzer armored col-<br />
umns in the Celles-Marche sector.<br />
For such a change of axis the Ger-<br />
mans needed turning room, and they<br />
could best gain it by seizing the road<br />
center at Grandménil just west of the<br />
Manhay crossroads. As a result, then,<br />
the major part of the 2d SS Panzer<br />
would turn away from the 7th Armored<br />
to engage General Hickey’s troops from<br />
the 3d Armored. Richardson’s t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force, really little more than a light<br />
tank platoon, had fallen back from<br />
Manhay to T<strong>as</strong>k Force Kane’s roadblock<br />
at Grandmenil. Here Kane had his<br />
trains and a platoon of tank destroyers.<br />
The Panthers, followed by the German<br />
infantry, pursued the Americans into<br />
Grandmenil. The American tank de-<br />
stroyers attempted a fight from the high<br />
ground west of the village but had no<br />
infantry in support and, <strong>as</strong> the grena-<br />
diers close in, withdrew westward along<br />
the road to Erezée. By 0300 on 25 De-<br />
cember, then, the Germans held Grand-<br />
ménil and were poised on the way west.<br />
It will be remembered that the new<br />
289th Infantry (Col. Dougl<strong>as</strong> B. Smith)<br />
had come into <strong>as</strong>sembly are<strong>as</strong> west of<br />
Grandménil on Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve in prep-<br />
aration for a dawn attack to drive the<br />
enemy off the wooded hills southwest<br />
of Grandménil. 7 The lead battalion, the<br />
3d, actually had started forward from<br />
its bivouac in Fanzel when it encoun-<br />
tered some 3d Armored tanks (the lat-<br />
ter supposed to be screening the 289th<br />
deployment) hurrying to the west.<br />
About this time the battalion received<br />
orders from Hickey that it should dig<br />
in to bar the two roads running west<br />
and northwest from Grandmenil. De-<br />
ploying <strong>as</strong> rapidly <strong>as</strong> possible in the<br />
deep snow, the battalion outposted the<br />
main west road to Erezée. The Germans<br />
negotiated this forward roadblock with-<br />
out a fight, the ubiquitous and deceptive<br />
Sherman tank again providing the ticket.<br />
When the panzers, some eight of<br />
them, arrived at the main foxhole line<br />
the German tankers swiveled their gun<br />
turrets facing north and south to bl<strong>as</strong>t<br />
the battalion into two halves. One un-<br />
known soldier in Company K w<strong>as</strong> un-<br />
daunted by this fusillade: he held his<br />
ground and put a bazooka round into<br />
the spot but he had stopped the enemy<br />
column cold in its tracks, for <strong>here</strong> the<br />
road edged a high cliff and the remain-<br />
ing panzers could not p<strong>as</strong>s their stricken<br />
mate. Apparently the Panther detach-<br />
7 Like nearly all green divisions the 75th In-<br />
fantry Division failed to keep or transmit really<br />
complete and useful historical records during its<br />
first combat operations. The bulk of the detailed<br />
information on the regimental actions of this<br />
division comes from the 3d Armored units to<br />
which the formations of the 75th were attached<br />
and from the combat interviews with the former.<br />
For the 289th Infantry, however, t<strong>here</strong> exists the<br />
written recollections of the regimental communica-<br />
tions officer, Capt. Walter G. Runte’s study in the<br />
Advanced Infantry <strong>Of</strong>ficers’ Course, Cl<strong>as</strong>s No. I.
592 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
ment had outrun its infantry support or<br />
w<strong>as</strong> apprehensive of a close engagement<br />
in the dark, for the German tanks backed<br />
off and returned to Grandménil.<br />
It took some time to reorganize the<br />
3d Battalion of the 289th, but about<br />
0800 the battalion set off on its <strong>as</strong>signed<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k of clearing the woods southwest of<br />
Grandménil. At the same time the rest<br />
of the regiment, on the right, moved<br />
into an attack to push the outposts<br />
of the 560th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
back from the Aisne River. General<br />
Hickey, however, needed more help<br />
than a green infantry regiment could<br />
give if the 3d Armored w<strong>as</strong> to halt<br />
the 2d SS Panzer and restore the block-<br />
ing position at Grandménil. His plea<br />
for <strong>as</strong>sistance w<strong>as</strong> carried by General<br />
Rose up the echelons of command, and<br />
finally CCB w<strong>as</strong> rele<strong>as</strong>ed from attach-<br />
ment to the 30th Division in the La<br />
Gleize sector to give the needed ar-<br />
mored punch.<br />
Early in the afternoon T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
McGeorge (a company each of armored<br />
infantry and Sherman tanks) arrived<br />
west of Grandménil. The t<strong>as</strong>k force w<strong>as</strong><br />
moving into the attack when dis<strong>as</strong>ter<br />
struck. Eleven P–38’s of the 430th Squa-<br />
dron, which were being vectored onto<br />
their targets by the 7th Armored Divi-<br />
sion, mistook McGeorge’s troops for<br />
Germans and made a bombing run over<br />
the wooded <strong>as</strong>sembly area. CCB later re-<br />
ported that 3 officers and 36 men were<br />
killed by the American bombs. Here<br />
again the failure of communications be-<br />
tween the 3d and 7th Armored Divi-<br />
sions had cost dear. 8 A new attack w<strong>as</strong><br />
8 CCB, S–3 Jnl and AAR. The 474th Squadron<br />
Operations report of 25 December 1944, says<br />
that the vehicles attacked were displaying orange<br />
panels. By this date, however, some German units<br />
mounted at 2000, McGeorge’s armored<br />
infantry and a company from the 289th<br />
preceding the American tanks in the<br />
dark. Within an hour five tanks<br />
and a small detachment of the armored<br />
infantry in half-tracks were in Grand-<br />
ménil, but the enemy promptly coun-<br />
terattacked and restored his hold on the<br />
village.<br />
The 2d SS Panzer had nevertheless<br />
failed on 25 December to enlarge the<br />
turning radius it needed around the<br />
Grandménil pivot. The German records<br />
show clearly what had stopped the ad-<br />
vance. Every time that the 3d Panzer<br />
Grenadier formed an <strong>as</strong>sault detach-<br />
ment to break out through the woods<br />
south and west of Grandménil, the<br />
American artillery observers located on<br />
the high ground to the north brought<br />
salvo after salvo cr<strong>as</strong>hing down. All<br />
movement along the roads seemed to be<br />
a signal for the Allied fighter-bombers<br />
to swoop down for the kill. 9 <strong>To</strong> make<br />
matters worse, the 9th SS Panzer had<br />
failed to close up on the 2d SS Panzer<br />
Division’s right. General Lammerding<br />
dared not swing his entire division in-<br />
to the drive westward and thus leave<br />
an open flank facing the American ar-<br />
mor known to be north of Manhay.<br />
Although General Ridgway had<br />
were using the distinctive U.S. orange insignia.<br />
The IX TAC operations summary of 25 December<br />
notes that the 7th Armored had set the co-ordinate<br />
P–5388 <strong>as</strong> the “no-bomb” line; everything to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, t<strong>here</strong>fore, w<strong>as</strong> fair game. McGeorge’s <strong>as</strong>sem-<br />
bly area w<strong>as</strong> almost exactly on the co-ordinates<br />
given.<br />
9 At 1345 on the 25th, General Kean, First <strong>Army</strong><br />
chief of staff, called the IX TAC and said that<br />
the first priority air mission for the entire First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> the enemy penetration at the junction<br />
of the XVIII Airborne and VII Corps. IX TAC,<br />
A–2 Jnl.
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 593<br />
ordered the 7th Armored to recapture<br />
Manhay “by dark tonight,” the means at<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck’s disposal on the 25th were<br />
meager. CCA, which had been employed<br />
earlier because it had come out of the<br />
St. Vith fight with the fewest wounds,<br />
now w<strong>as</strong> in poor shape indeed, having<br />
lost nearly two medium tank companies<br />
and much of its tank destroyer comple-<br />
ment. CCB had not yet been reorganized<br />
(and in any c<strong>as</strong>e it w<strong>as</strong> very much below<br />
strength in men and vehicles) but it<br />
could furnish two understrength tank<br />
companies and one company of armored<br />
infantry. The main road into Manhay<br />
from the north, intended <strong>as</strong> the avenue<br />
of H<strong>as</strong>brouck’s advance, would take some<br />
hours to clear, for the retreating tankers<br />
had littered it with felled trees during<br />
the night withdrawal. <strong>To</strong> get at grips<br />
with the enemy from this direction the<br />
2d Battalion of the 424th Infantry w<strong>as</strong><br />
added to the attack; the whole operation<br />
would, or so it w<strong>as</strong> hoped, mesh with<br />
the 3d Armored advance on Grandménil<br />
from the west.<br />
The abatis on the Manhay road<br />
effectively stopped the 7th Armored<br />
tanks. When a company of six tanks<br />
lined up for a charge into Manhay from<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t, half of them were knocked<br />
out; General H<strong>as</strong>brouck, who w<strong>as</strong> on<br />
the scene, ordered the remaining tanks<br />
to retire. The battalion from the 424th<br />
did succeed in nearing the village but<br />
paid a heavy toll for the few hundred<br />
yards crossed-later estimated <strong>as</strong> some<br />
35 percent c<strong>as</strong>ualties-and at dark w<strong>as</strong><br />
ordered back to the north.<br />
The Fight in the Aisne Valley<br />
While the 2d SS Panzer w<strong>as</strong> struggling<br />
to shake itself loose for the drive<br />
west along the Erezée-Soy road, the<br />
battle-weary and depleted 560th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division fought to gain con-<br />
trol of the western section of the same<br />
road between Soy and Hotton. Having<br />
driven a salient north in the Aisne valley,<br />
the left wing of this division set up a<br />
night attack on Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve intended<br />
to dislodge T<strong>as</strong>k Force Orr from the<br />
Aisne bridgehead at Amonines. This<br />
small American t<strong>as</strong>k force held a three-<br />
mile front-little more than a chain of<br />
pickets-with no support on the flanks<br />
and no troops to cover its rear. When<br />
evening came, crisp and clear, the enemy<br />
guns and rocket launchers set to work.<br />
Probably the Germans used a battalion<br />
of infantry, making twelve separate at-<br />
tempts to break through Orr’s line. At<br />
one point they were near success: Orr<br />
said later, “If they’d have had three<br />
more riflemen they’d probably have over-<br />
run our positions.” But the attacker<br />
lacked the “three more riflemen” and<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Orr retained control of<br />
Amonines.<br />
While the enemy hammered futilely<br />
at T<strong>as</strong>k Force Orr on the night of 24<br />
December, Hogan’s encircled t<strong>as</strong>k force<br />
far to the south at Marcouray finally<br />
made a break to reach the American<br />
lines. 10 All the operable vehicles were<br />
destroyed or damaged, and the wounded<br />
were left in the charge of volunteer<br />
medical aid men. Guiding on the stars<br />
and comp<strong>as</strong>s, Hogan’s men moved<br />
stealthily through the enemy positions.<br />
At one point a German sentry gave a<br />
challenge, but a sergeant got to him<br />
with a bayonet before he could spread<br />
the alarm. Most members of the t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
10 The early story of Hogan’s t<strong>as</strong>k force is told<br />
in Chapter XV.
594 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
force reached their comrades by<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> morning.<br />
The appearance of the 75th Infantry<br />
Division (Maj. Gen. Fay B. Prickett) in<br />
the 3d Armored sector promised the<br />
needed rifle strength to establish a solid<br />
defense in the rugged country e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Hotton and along the bluffs of the Aisne<br />
River. <strong>To</strong> establish a homogeneous line<br />
the Americans would have to seize the<br />
high, wooded, and difficult ground south<br />
of the Soy-Hotton road, and at the<br />
same time push forward on the left to<br />
close up to the banks of the Aisne over<br />
the tortuous terrain south of the Erezée-<br />
Grandmenil road. With the two regi-<br />
ments of the 75th attached to the 3d<br />
Armored (the 289th Infantry and the<br />
290th Infantry), General Rose ordered<br />
a drive to cement the CCA wing in the<br />
west,<br />
The units of the 75th had been scat-<br />
tered in widely separated are<strong>as</strong> after<br />
their arrival in Belgium. A smooth-<br />
running supply system had not yet been<br />
set up, and to concentrate and support<br />
the rifle battalions would prove difficult.<br />
But the 290th (Col. Carl F. Duffner),<br />
which had been moving into a defensive<br />
position around Petit Han, north of Hot-<br />
ton, received orders at 1600 on the 24th<br />
to <strong>as</strong>semble at Ny for an attack to begin<br />
two hours later. T<strong>here</strong> ensued much<br />
confusion, with orders and counter-<br />
orders, and finally the attack w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
scheduled for a half-hour before mid-<br />
night. The regiment had no idea of the<br />
ground over which it w<strong>as</strong> to fight but did<br />
know that the line of departure w<strong>as</strong> then<br />
held by a battalion or less of the 517th<br />
Parachute Infantry Regiment deployed<br />
along the Soy-Hotton road. The 2d and<br />
3d Battalions of the 290th were chosen<br />
for this first battle, their objective the<br />
wooded ridge south of the road.<br />
About midnight on the 24th the battalions<br />
started their <strong>as</strong>sault companies<br />
forward, crossing a small stream and<br />
ravine, then halting to reorganize at a<br />
tree line which edged a broad meadow<br />
over which the <strong>as</strong>sault had to be carried.<br />
Here all w<strong>as</strong> confusion and the companies<br />
were not straightened out until<br />
dawn. Finally the <strong>as</strong>sault began, straight<br />
across the open, snow-covered meadow<br />
beyond which lay the ridge line objective.<br />
Losses among these green troops<br />
were severe and most of the officers were<br />
killed or wounded. Despite this harsh<br />
baptism of fire the troops reached the<br />
wood cover at the foot of the ridge<br />
and held on. In midafternoon more<br />
infantry came up (probably from the<br />
517th), plus a platoon of tank destroyers,<br />
and a fresh <strong>as</strong>sault w<strong>as</strong> now<br />
organized. This carried through the<br />
woods and onto the ridge. Participants<br />
in the action later estimated that the<br />
3d Battalion, 290th Infantry, alone suffered<br />
250 c<strong>as</strong>ualties, but this figure<br />
probably is exaggerated 11 .<br />
Farther e<strong>as</strong>t the 289th Infantry also<br />
had a rough introduction to battle on<br />
rugged terrain far more difficult than<br />
any training ground in the States. On<br />
the night of 24 December the regiment<br />
moved by truck to Fanzel, north of<br />
Erezée, t<strong>here</strong> receiving orders to attack<br />
at 0800 the next morning and seize the<br />
high ground north of the Aisne. Early<br />
on Christm<strong>as</strong> morning, <strong>as</strong> already related,<br />
the 3d Battalion w<strong>as</strong> h<strong>as</strong>tily thrown<br />
into the fight being waged by the 3d<br />
Armored troops west of Grandménil.<br />
By the hour set for the 289th to attack,<br />
11 Capt. David C. Clagett, Study for the Advanced<br />
Infantry <strong>Of</strong>ficers Course, cl<strong>as</strong>s 1.
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 595<br />
however, a part of the 3d Battalion<br />
could be freed to move into the regi-<br />
mental advance. The 560th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division had only a thin screen<br />
facing the 289th and by dusk the 3d<br />
Battalion w<strong>as</strong> on its objective, the hill<br />
m<strong>as</strong>s southwest of Grandmenil. On the<br />
right flank the 1st Battalion reached the<br />
line of the Aisne, but in the center the<br />
2d Battalion lost its direction in the<br />
maze of wooded hills and ravines. By<br />
midnight of the 25th it had gravitated<br />
into and around La Fosse, a village<br />
southwest of Grandmenil, leaving a wide<br />
gap between itself and the 1st Battalion.<br />
The next day, under a new commander,<br />
the 2d Battalion deployed along the<br />
Aisne but still had no contact with the<br />
1st. 12<br />
The 2d SS Panzer Is Halted<br />
Although the 2d SS Panzer Division<br />
still held Grandmenil and Manhay on<br />
the morning of 26 December, it had<br />
lost much of its bite and d<strong>as</strong>h. The two<br />
grenadier regiments had been whittled<br />
down considerably; the 4th Panzer<br />
Grenadier had lost heavily, particularly<br />
in officers, during the fight for the<br />
Baraque de Fraiture. Across the lines<br />
thirteen battalions of field artillery were<br />
firing into the German positions between<br />
the Aisne and the Lienne, and the II SS<br />
Panzer Corps had been unable to bring<br />
forward enough artillery and ammuni-<br />
tion to engage in any counterbattery<br />
12 The price for the intial commitment of the<br />
two regiments from the 75th w<strong>as</strong> relatively high.<br />
The total losses of CCA, 3d Armored, during<br />
the fighting from 22 to 31 December were 70<br />
killed, 376 wounded, and 218 missing. <strong>Of</strong> this<br />
total the attached 289th Infantry alone lost 37<br />
killed, 208 wounded, and 79 missing. 289th Inf<br />
AAR, Dec 44.<br />
duels, So heavy w<strong>as</strong> the traffic on the<br />
meager Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> line of com-<br />
munications, and moving <strong>as</strong> it did by<br />
fits and starts under the watchful eyes<br />
of Allied air, that only one battalion of<br />
corps artillery and one corps Werfer<br />
battalion succeeded in crossing to the<br />
west bank of the Salm. Ammunition<br />
resupply from the rear w<strong>as</strong> almost non-<br />
existent. On Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve the corps<br />
had taken matters in its hands and dis-<br />
patched its own trucks to the ammu-<br />
nition dumps back at Bonn, but each<br />
round trip would take three to four<br />
nights because the daylight movement<br />
of thin-skinned vehicles carrying high<br />
explosive w<strong>as</strong> almost certain suicide.<br />
Finally, the 9th SS Panzer had failed<br />
to keep to schedule and probably would<br />
not come abre<strong>as</strong>t of the 2d SS until the<br />
night of 26 December.<br />
But General Lammerding could not<br />
delay his bid for a breakout until rein-<br />
forcements arrived. On the morning of<br />
the 26th he ordered the 4th Panzer<br />
Grenadier to attack northward, using<br />
Manhay and the forest to the e<strong>as</strong>t <strong>as</strong> a<br />
line of departure. The 3d Panzer Grena-<br />
dier would have to make the main<br />
effort, forcing its way out of Grandmenil<br />
and along the road west to Erezée.<br />
The enemy attempt to shake loose<br />
and break into the clear proved abortive.<br />
On the right the 4th Panzer Grenadier<br />
sent a battalion from the woods e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Manhay into an early morning attack<br />
that collided with Billingslea’s glider<br />
infantry in Tri-le-Cheslaing. In the pre-<br />
dawn darkness some of the grenadiers<br />
sneaked in on the battalion command<br />
post, only to be driven off by a reserve<br />
platoon. A move to encircle the village<br />
from the e<strong>as</strong>t w<strong>as</strong> beaten back almost<br />
singlehandedly by a stray Sherman tank
596 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
which the glider infantry had com-<br />
mandeered during the 7th Armored<br />
withdrawal. When daylight came the<br />
enemy <strong>as</strong>sault force w<strong>as</strong> in full retreat,<br />
back to the woods. Plans for a second<br />
attack north from Manhay died aborn-<br />
ing, for by that time the Americans had<br />
the initiative.<br />
The German advance out of Grand-<br />
ménil w<strong>as</strong> planned <strong>as</strong> a double-pronged<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault: one column thrusting straight<br />
west on the Erezée road; the other<br />
heading off to the northwest along a<br />
narrow, precipitous road which would<br />
bring it to Mormont and a flanking<br />
position vis-à-vis Erezée. The westward<br />
move began at false dawn, by chance<br />
coinciding with T<strong>as</strong>k Force McGeorge’s<br />
renewal of its attack to enter Grand-<br />
ménil. Again the road limited the action<br />
to a head-on tank duel. McGeorge’s<br />
Shermans were outgunned by the Pan-<br />
thers, and when the shooting died down<br />
the American detachment had only two<br />
medium tanks in going condition.<br />
Sometime after this skirmish one of<br />
the American tanks which had reached<br />
the edge of the village during the<br />
attack of the previous evening suddenly<br />
came alive and roared out to join the<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k force. What had happened w<strong>as</strong> one<br />
of the oddities born of night fighting.<br />
Captain Jordan of the 1st Battalion, 33d<br />
Armored Regiment, had led five tanks<br />
into Grandménil, but during the earlier<br />
fight four had been hit or abandoned<br />
by their crews. Jordan and his crew sat<br />
through the night in the midst of the<br />
dead tanks, unmolested by the enemy.<br />
When the captain reported to his head-<br />
quarters, he told of seeing a German<br />
column, at le<strong>as</strong>t twelve Panthers,<br />
rumbling out of Grandménil in a north-<br />
erly direction. The 3d Armored put up<br />
a liaison plane to find the enemy tanks,<br />
but to no avail. It is known that Com-<br />
pany L of the 289th Infantry knocked<br />
out a Panther leading a vehicular col-<br />
umn through a narrow gorge on the<br />
Mormont road and took a number of<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties during a scrambling fight be-<br />
tween bazook<strong>as</strong> and tank weapons. The<br />
German accounts say that this road w<strong>as</strong><br />
blocked by fallen timber and that in-<br />
tense American artillery fire halted all<br />
movement north of Grandmenil. What-<br />
ever the re<strong>as</strong>on, this group of tanks<br />
made no further effort to force the Mor-<br />
mont road. 13<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force McGeorge received six-<br />
teen additional Shermans at noon and<br />
a couple of hours later, on the heels<br />
of a three-battalion artillery shoot, burst<br />
through to retake Grandmenil. The<br />
pounding meted out by the 3d Armored<br />
gunners apparently drove most of the<br />
grenadiers in flight from the village;<br />
by dark the 3d Battalion of the 289th<br />
had occupied half of the village and held<br />
the road to Manhay.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remains to tell of the 7th<br />
Armored’s attempt to recapture<br />
Manhay. <strong>To</strong> visualize the 7th Armored<br />
<strong>as</strong> a ready combat division at this time<br />
would be to distort reality. By the<br />
26th its three armored infantry bat-<br />
talions were woefully understrength, and<br />
less than 40 percent of its tanks and<br />
tank destroyers were operable. Even this<br />
very reduced capability could not be<br />
13 The man who stopped the lead tank may<br />
have been T/Sgt. Stephen G. Andromid<strong>as</strong> of Com-<br />
pany L (Ltr, Maj. C. W. Anderson to Maj. Gen.<br />
William F. Train, 13 Dec 60). It is also possible<br />
that these German tanks were checked by a tank<br />
destroyer of the 629th Tank Destroyer Battalion.<br />
Sgt. Oscar M. Mullins and Pfc. Edwin W. Metz<br />
were awarded the DSC (both posthumously) for<br />
stopping an attack of “fourteen” enemy tanks on<br />
this date.
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 597<br />
employed with full effect against the<br />
enemy. It w<strong>as</strong> only a matter of hours<br />
since the 7th Armored had been driven<br />
from St. Vith, and the officers, men, and<br />
vehicles of most of its units were spread<br />
about helter-skelter from village to vil-<br />
lage just <strong>as</strong> they had arrived back in the<br />
American lines after the disorganization<br />
attendant on the withdrawal across the<br />
Salm. The problem of combat morale<br />
is more difficult for the historian, writing<br />
long after the event, to analyze. H<strong>as</strong>-<br />
brouck’s division had made a fight of<br />
it at St. Vith, more than meriting the<br />
eulogy of Field Marshal Montgomery’s<br />
retreat order, “They come back in all<br />
honor”; but it w<strong>as</strong> too much to expect<br />
of human flesh and blood, mind and<br />
heart, that the 7th Armored should<br />
continue, only hours after the retreat,<br />
to demonstrate the same high order of<br />
combat efficiency seen in the defense<br />
of St. Vith.<br />
General H<strong>as</strong>brouck had no plans for<br />
retaking Manhay on the morning of the<br />
26th; he counted rather on a few hours<br />
to regroup his command. But about 0900<br />
General Collins called from the VII<br />
Corps to <strong>as</strong>k that Ridgway put the 7th<br />
Armored into an attack at Manhay <strong>as</strong><br />
an <strong>as</strong>sist for the 3d Armored drive<br />
against the twin village of Grandménil.<br />
DESTRUCTION AT GRANDMÉNIL, including a damaged Panzerkampfwagen V (Panther).
598 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Within the hour the First <strong>Army</strong> Com-<br />
mander had General Ridgway on the<br />
telephone, insisting that the 7th Ar-<br />
mored must attack-and that forthwith.<br />
Ridgway could do no more than tell<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck to retake Manhay “<strong>as</strong> soon<br />
<strong>as</strong> possible.” The 7th Armored com-<br />
mander put the few tanks he could scrape<br />
together into a march toward the road<br />
linking Manhay and Grandménil, but<br />
this move w<strong>as</strong> slow in starting and the<br />
3d Armored troops entered Grandménil<br />
while the 7th Armored tanks still were<br />
several hundred yards to the north.<br />
About this time the 7th Armored de-<br />
tachment came under accurate direct<br />
fire from some German tanks dug in<br />
north of the connecting road and the<br />
Americans halted.<br />
Meanwhile Allied fighter-bombers<br />
had been vectored over Manhay to soften<br />
up the defenders, and General Ridgway<br />
decided to use the fresh 3d Battalion of<br />
the 517th Parachute Infantry, which had<br />
just come down from helping the 30th<br />
Division in the La Gleize operation, for<br />
a night <strong>as</strong>sault at Manhay. This attack,<br />
made an hour or so after midnight and<br />
preceded by an eight-battalion artillery<br />
concentration fired for twenty minutes,<br />
gained quick success. By 0400 on 27<br />
December the paratroopers had cleared<br />
the village, at a cost of ten killed and<br />
fourteen wounded. By dawn airborne<br />
engineers had cleared the fallen trees<br />
from the road back to Werbomont, and<br />
a platoon of medium tanks moved in<br />
to cover the approaches to the village.<br />
Some clue to the e<strong>as</strong>e with which the<br />
paratroopers took Manhay–not forget-<br />
ting, of course, the weight of metal<br />
thrown into the town by the American<br />
cannoneers–may be found in the<br />
German account of events on the 26th.<br />
It would appear that the 7th Armored<br />
tank detachment which had neared the<br />
Grandménil-Manhay road had convinced<br />
the commander of the 3d Panzer Grena-<br />
dier that his battalion in Manhay w<strong>as</strong><br />
in danger of being surrounded (partic-<br />
ularly since Billingslea’s paratroopers to<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t had driven back the 4th Grena-<br />
diers) and that he had ordered the<br />
Manhay garrison to withdraw under<br />
cover of night, leaving its wounded be-<br />
hind.<br />
The loss of Manhay ended the 2d<br />
SS Panzer battle in this sector, and the<br />
German corps and division commanders<br />
agreed that t<strong>here</strong> seemed little chance<br />
of starting the attack rolling again. On<br />
the morning of the 27th orders from<br />
Sepp Dietrich told General Lammerding<br />
that his division would be relieved by<br />
the 9th SS Panzer Division and that the<br />
2d SS Panzer would move west to join<br />
the 560th Volks Grenadier Division and<br />
the newly arrived 12th SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sion in a new Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> attack<br />
directed at the Hotton-Soy-Erezée line.<br />
The 82d Airborne Withdraws From<br />
the Salm River Line<br />
When the XVIII Airborne Corps<br />
commander ordered the defense of St.<br />
Vith abandoned on 23 December, one<br />
of his chief concerns w<strong>as</strong> the mounting<br />
enemy strength which threatened to out-<br />
flank and overrun the small detach-<br />
ments of the 82d Airborne Division,<br />
plus the 3d Battalion, 112th Infantry,<br />
deployed to hold the bridgeheads at<br />
Salmchâteau and Vielsalm through<br />
which the St. Vith garrison had to with-<br />
draw. The 82d, it will be remembered,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> forced to hurry troops from its north<br />
flank, w<strong>here</strong> they had been involved in
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 599<br />
hard battle with the 1st SS Panzer Divi-<br />
sion around Trois Ponts and Cheneux,<br />
in order to reinforce the opposite flank<br />
of the division, which extended from<br />
Salmchâteau west to Fraiture, at Frai-<br />
ture dangling in the air. The danger<br />
now w<strong>as</strong> that the German armor already<br />
on the west side of the Salm River would<br />
speed to turn this open flank and crush<br />
the 82d Airborne back against the Salm,<br />
or at the le<strong>as</strong>t make a powerful jab<br />
straight along the west bank to dislodge<br />
the American hold on the two bridge-<br />
head towns. Kampfgruppe Krag, <strong>as</strong> al-<br />
ready recounted, did succeed in doing<br />
exactly that at Salmchâteau late on the<br />
23d and entrapped part of T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Jones and the l<strong>as</strong>t column of the<br />
112th Infantry on their way back from<br />
St. Vith.<br />
The 9th SS Panzer Division, charged<br />
in the enemy scheme with breaking<br />
across the river at Salmchâteau and<br />
Vielsalm and <strong>here</strong> rolling up the 82d<br />
Airborne south wing, failed to arrive<br />
at the Salm on schedule. As a result<br />
General Gavin w<strong>as</strong> faced with one<br />
major threat against his position, on the<br />
night of 23 December posed by the<br />
2d SS Panzer and the Fuehrer Begleit<br />
Brigade at Fraiture, rather than two <strong>as</strong><br />
the II SS Panzer Corps had hoped. By<br />
midday on the 24th, however, the<br />
Germans had patrols across the river<br />
at Vielsalm. This covering force came<br />
from the 19th Panzer Grenadier Regi-<br />
ment, recruited from Germans living in<br />
the Black Sea area, and it had earned<br />
a reputation <strong>as</strong> the élite regiment of<br />
the 9th SS Panzer Division. The rest of<br />
the 9th SS Panzer either had been de-<br />
tached on other missions or w<strong>as</strong> strag-<br />
gling to the e<strong>as</strong>t–indeed, the divisional<br />
tank regiment did not reach the Salm<br />
sector until the first days of January.<br />
American identification of this new<br />
armored division, however, added to the<br />
list of factors that resulted in the de-<br />
cision to withdraw the 82d Airborne<br />
and shorten the XVIII Airborne Corps<br />
line.<br />
Early on Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve General<br />
Gavin met with some of his officers in<br />
the command post of Ekman’s 505th.<br />
He knew that his division w<strong>as</strong> faced<br />
by elements of at le<strong>as</strong>t three German<br />
divisions, his right w<strong>as</strong> overextended,<br />
the support which might be expected<br />
from his right wing neighbor w<strong>as</strong><br />
problematical, and a large German force<br />
(the remnants of Kampfgruppe Peiper)<br />
w<strong>as</strong> actually in his rear somew<strong>here</strong><br />
near Trois Ponts. Gavin now had to<br />
decide whether he should divert some<br />
of his troops to hunt out and fight the<br />
enemy in his rear or proceed with the<br />
planned withdrawal. The main problem,<br />
Gavin concluded, w<strong>as</strong> to put his division<br />
in an organized position, dug in with<br />
wire and mines in place, to confront<br />
the attack of “several” panzer divisions<br />
on the morning of the 25th. He held,<br />
then, to his plan for withdrawing the<br />
82d Airborne. 14<br />
Gavin’s plan w<strong>as</strong> to bring back the<br />
bulk of his regiments under cover of<br />
night; he would leave small detach-<br />
ments from each <strong>as</strong> covering shells until<br />
the early morning. About 2100 the divi-<br />
sion moved out for the new Trois Ponts<br />
–Manhay line. Christm<strong>as</strong> Eve w<strong>as</strong><br />
crystal clear and the moonlight on the<br />
14<br />
For this ph<strong>as</strong>e of the action, the most useful<br />
materials are W. G. Lord, <strong>History</strong> of the 508th<br />
Parachute Infantry (W<strong>as</strong>hington, 1948); 82d Abn<br />
Div, Chronology, Dec 44; 82d Abn Div, The Story<br />
of the Bulge: The Division Commander’s Report;<br />
and especially the combat interviews.
600 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
snow made it e<strong>as</strong>y to follow the routes<br />
<strong>as</strong>signed. (Overhead the buzzbombs<br />
could be traced on their flight to<br />
Antwerp.) At only two points did the<br />
enemy interfere with the marching col-<br />
umns of the 82d Airborne, and at only<br />
one of these by design. After the de-<br />
bacle at La Gleize, Colonel Peiper and<br />
some 800 of his kampfgruppe had taken<br />
refuge in the densely wooded and broken<br />
ground north of Trois Ponts, waiting<br />
for an opportunity to cross the Salm and<br />
rejoin their comrades of the 1st SS Pan-<br />
zer. The hour chosen by Peiper coin-<br />
cided with the move made by the 505th<br />
Parachute Infantry <strong>as</strong> it pivoted on<br />
Trois Ponts back from the river. The<br />
two forces, both attempting to with-<br />
draw, brushed against each other and<br />
one company of the 505th got into a<br />
brief but hot fire with Peiper’s men.<br />
Colonel Ekman, however, had a mission<br />
to complete before day dawned and with<br />
General Gavin’s permission the 505th<br />
let Peiper go.<br />
The second action this night w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
accident. It involved the covering force<br />
of the 508th, led by Lt. Col. Thom<strong>as</strong><br />
Shanley, in what the regiment later re-<br />
corded <strong>as</strong> “one of the best pieces of<br />
fighting in the 508th’s history.” The<br />
main body started on the seven-mile trek<br />
to its new line with no sign of the<br />
enemy and by 0415 w<strong>as</strong> in position. Some<br />
time around midnight the covering pla-<br />
toons near the Vielsalm bridge site (one<br />
each from Companies A and B) heard<br />
much noise and hammering coming from<br />
the direction of the bridge, which the<br />
airborne engineers had partially de-<br />
molished. Suddenly artillery and mortar<br />
shells erupted around the American fox-<br />
hole line, a barrage followed by smoke<br />
shells. Out of the smoke rose dark figures,<br />
whooping and yelling <strong>as</strong> they charged<br />
the paratroopers. The platoon from<br />
Company B had a few moments to get<br />
set and then stopped the grenadiers with<br />
machine gun fire before they could reach<br />
the position. The Company A platoon,<br />
closer to the river’s edge, had a worse<br />
time of it. Here a few of the enemy<br />
got into the American position, while<br />
others blocked the withdrawal route<br />
to the west. At one point the 508th<br />
wrote this platoon off <strong>as</strong> lost; but skill-<br />
fully led by 1st Lt. George D. Lamm<br />
the paratroopers fought their way<br />
through the enemy and back to their<br />
own lines.<br />
The 19th Regiment, which had hit<br />
the paratroopers at Vielsalm, followed<br />
the American spoor doggedly, despite<br />
the laggard pace of the rest of the divi-<br />
sion, and in the early afternoon of 25<br />
December w<strong>as</strong> observed in Odrimont, a<br />
couple of miles from the 508th outpost<br />
line. That night the 19th hit the regi-<br />
mental left, with perhaps two bat-<br />
talions making the <strong>as</strong>sault, but w<strong>as</strong> beat-<br />
en back after a three-hour fire fight. Two<br />
nights later the 19th struck again, this<br />
time driving on a narrow front against<br />
the right wing of the 508th. Company<br />
G w<strong>as</strong> driven out of the twin villages<br />
of Erria and Villettes w<strong>here</strong> it w<strong>as</strong><br />
bivouacked, but this penetration came<br />
to an abrupt halt when two artillery<br />
battalions went to work. The following<br />
morning the commander of the 3d<br />
Battalion (Lt. Col. Louis G. Mendez)<br />
organized a counterattack which swept<br />
through Erria (catching a number of the<br />
tired grenadiers still <strong>as</strong>leep in captured<br />
bedrolls) and restored the line. The<br />
American gunners had done much to<br />
take the sting out of the enemy force-<br />
over 100 German dead were counted
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 601<br />
around the village crossroad (the<br />
German account relates that the 1st Bat-<br />
talion of the 19th w<strong>as</strong> “cut to pieces”<br />
<strong>here</strong>) .<br />
“The Sad Suck Affair”<br />
As the year came to a close the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> made one l<strong>as</strong>t effort to<br />
breach the American defenses between<br />
the Salm and the Ourthe. This battle<br />
took place in and around the hamlet<br />
of Sadzot (so tiny that it does not appear<br />
on most of the Belgian maps). Sadzot<br />
lay on a small creek 400 yards south<br />
of Briscol, a village on the main road<br />
between Grandménil and Erezée. The<br />
engagement at Sadzot w<strong>as</strong> fought by<br />
squads and platoons, and so may be<br />
appropriately called a “soldiers’ battle”;<br />
with equal propriety the name coined<br />
by the GI’s for this confused action is<br />
used <strong>here</strong>: “The Sad Sack Affair.” 15<br />
Having given up the fight for Manhay<br />
and Grandménil, the 2d SS Panzer began<br />
to parcel out its troops. Some were left<br />
to cover the deployment of the 9th<br />
SS Panzer <strong>as</strong> it extended its position in<br />
front of the 82d Airborne to take over<br />
the onetime 2d SS Panzer sector. Other<br />
units shifted west to join the incoming<br />
12th SS Panzer in what w<strong>as</strong> planned<br />
<strong>as</strong> a major attack to cross the Trois Ponts<br />
–Hotton road in the vicinity of Erezée<br />
and regain momentum for the drive to<br />
the northwest. Once again, however, the<br />
forces actually available to the II SS<br />
Panzer Corps were considerably fewer<br />
15 The German account of this action will be<br />
found in MS # P–032E. The best American<br />
account is that given in Spearhead In the West.<br />
See also journals of the 289th Infantry and CCA,<br />
3d Armored Division. The paratroopers took the<br />
main losses in this fight: 120 c<strong>as</strong>ualties.<br />
than planned. The march west by the<br />
12th SS Panzer Division had taken much<br />
longer than reckoned, for the slow-<br />
moving 9th SS Panzer had jammed the<br />
roads in front of the 12th SS Panzer,<br />
t<strong>here</strong> had been a series of fuel failures,<br />
Allied air attacks had cut most of the<br />
march to night movement, and just <strong>as</strong><br />
the division w<strong>as</strong> nearing the Aisne<br />
River OB WEST had seized the rear-<br />
ward columns for use at B<strong>as</strong>togne. All<br />
that the 12th SS Panzer could employ on<br />
27 December, the date set by the army<br />
commander for the new attack, w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
25th Panzer Grenadier Regiment, most<br />
of which w<strong>as</strong> already in the line facing<br />
the 3d Armored. The 2d SS Panzer con-<br />
tribution perforce w<strong>as</strong> limited: its re-<br />
connaissance battalion, a battalion of<br />
mobile guns, and two rifle companies,<br />
a t<strong>as</strong>k force commanded by the same<br />
Major Krag who had raised such havoc<br />
at Salmchâteau. The time for the attack<br />
w<strong>as</strong> midnight.<br />
During the 27th the lines of General<br />
Hickey’s command had been redressed.<br />
In the process the 1st Battalion of the<br />
289th Infantry had tied in with T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Orr on the Aisne River while the<br />
2d Battalion, having finally straightened<br />
itself out, continued the 3d Armored<br />
line through the woods southwest of<br />
Grandménil. Unknown at the time,<br />
a 1,000-yard gap had developed south of<br />
Sadzot and Briscol between these two<br />
battalions.<br />
At zero hour the German <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
force started forward through the deep<br />
woods; the night w<strong>as</strong> dark, the ground<br />
pathless, steep, and broken. The grena-<br />
diers made good progress, but radio<br />
failed in the thick woods and it would<br />
appear that a part of the attackers<br />
became disoriented. At le<strong>as</strong>t two com-
602<br />
panies from the 25th Panzer Grenadier<br />
Regiment did manage to find their way<br />
through the gap between the battalions<br />
of the 289th and followed the creek into<br />
Sadzot, w<strong>here</strong> they struck about two<br />
hours after the jump-off.<br />
The course of battle <strong>as</strong> it developed<br />
in the early morning hours of 28 De-<br />
cember is extremely confused. The first<br />
report of the German appearance in<br />
Sadzot w<strong>as</strong> relayed to higher headquar-<br />
ters at 0200 by artillery observers belong-<br />
ing to the 54th Armored Field Artillery<br />
Battalion, whose howitzers were em-<br />
placed north of the village. The two<br />
American rifle battalions, when queried,<br />
reported no sign of the enemy. Inside<br />
Sadzot were bivouacked Company C of<br />
the 87th Chemical Battalion and a tank<br />
destroyer platoon; these troops rapidly<br />
recovered from their surprise and during<br />
the melee established a firm hold on<br />
the north side of the village. General<br />
Hickey immediately alerted the 509th<br />
Parachute Infantry Battalion near<br />
Erezée to make an envelopment of<br />
Sadzot from west and e<strong>as</strong>t, but no sooner<br />
had the paratroopers deployed than they<br />
ran into Krag’s kampfgruppe.<br />
This meeting engagement in the dark-<br />
ness seems to have been a catch-<strong>as</strong>-catch-<br />
can affair. The American radios, like<br />
the German, failed to function in this<br />
terrain (the 3d Armored communi-<br />
cations throughout the battle were most-<br />
ly by wire and runner); the Germans<br />
were confused and put mortar fire on<br />
their own neighboring platoons; and<br />
the fight on both sides w<strong>as</strong> carried by<br />
squads and platoons firing at whatever<br />
moved. When daylight came the para-<br />
troopers got artillery support, which<br />
far outweighed the single battalion be-<br />
hind the enemy <strong>as</strong>sault force, and<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
moved forward. By 1100 the 509th had<br />
<strong>click</strong>ed the trap shut on the Germans<br />
inside Sadzot.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remained the t<strong>as</strong>k of closing<br />
the gap between the two battalions of<br />
the 289th. General Hickey put in the<br />
2d Battalion of the 112th Infantry at<br />
dark on the 28th, but this outfit, h<strong>as</strong>tily<br />
summoned to the fight, lost its direction<br />
and failed to seal the gap. Early on the<br />
morning of the 29th Hickey, believing<br />
that the 112th had made the line of<br />
departure secure, sent the 509th and<br />
six light tanks to attack toward the<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t. But the enemy had reorgan-<br />
ized in the meantime, put in what<br />
probably w<strong>as</strong> a fresh battalion, and be-<br />
gun a new march on Sadzot. In the<br />
collision that followed, a section of<br />
German 75-mm. antitank guns destroyed<br />
three of the light tanks and the para-<br />
troopers recoiled; but so did the enemy.<br />
During the morning the 2d Battalion,<br />
112th Infantry, got its bearings—or so<br />
it w<strong>as</strong> believed—and set out to push a<br />
bar across the corridor from the west,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> contact with the 1st Battalion of<br />
the 289th w<strong>as</strong> firm, to the e<strong>as</strong>t and the<br />
socket provided the 2d Battalion, 289th.<br />
Across the deep ravines and rugged hills<br />
American troops were sighted, and be-<br />
lieving these to be the 2d Battalion<br />
the troops from the 112th veered toward<br />
them. What had been seen, however,<br />
proved to be the paratroopers of the<br />
509th. After this misadventure and the<br />
jolt suffered by the paratroopers, Hickey<br />
and the battalion commanders con-<br />
cerned worked out a co-ordinated attack.<br />
First the paratroopers put in a twilight<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault which forced the Germans back.<br />
Then the 2d Battalion of the 112th made<br />
a night attack with marching fire, guid-<br />
ing this time on 60-mm. illuminating
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 603<br />
mortar shells fired by the 2d Battalion of<br />
the 289th. Crossing through deep ravines<br />
the infantrymen of the 112th drove<br />
the enemy from their path. At dawn on<br />
the 29th the gap finally w<strong>as</strong> closed.<br />
The German failure to penetrate<br />
through the Erezée section on 28–29<br />
December w<strong>as</strong> the l<strong>as</strong>t serious bid by<br />
the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> in an offensive<br />
role. On that day Field Marshal Model<br />
ordered Sepp Dietrich to go over to the<br />
defensive and began stripping the Sixth<br />
of its armor. The German commanders<br />
left facing the VII and XVIII Airborne<br />
Corps e<strong>as</strong>t of the Ourthe record a<br />
number of attacks ordered between 29<br />
December and 2 January, the units in-<br />
volved including infantry detachments<br />
from the 9th SS Panzer Division and<br />
the 18th and 62d Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sions. But to order these weak and<br />
tired units into the attack when the<br />
German foot soldier knew that the<br />
great offensive w<strong>as</strong> ended w<strong>as</strong> one thing,<br />
to press the <strong>as</strong>sault itself w<strong>as</strong> quite<br />
another. The American divisions in this<br />
sector note only at the turn of the year:<br />
“front quiet,” or “routine patrolling.”<br />
The initiative had clearly p<strong>as</strong>sed to<br />
the Americans. General Ridgway, who<br />
had been champing at the bit to go over<br />
to the offensive even when his corps<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not hard pressed, sought per-<br />
mission to start an attack on the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
day of the year with the XVIII Air-<br />
borne, but Field Marshal Montgomery<br />
already had decided that the Allied<br />
offensive on the north flank would be<br />
initiated farther to the west by Collins’<br />
corps and had set the date–3 January<br />
1945.<br />
The Elsenborn Shoulder<br />
The four infantry divisions of the V<br />
Corps by 24 December formed a firm<br />
barrier along the northern shoulder of<br />
the deepening German salient. This<br />
front, extending from Monschau to<br />
Waimes, relapsed into relative inactivity.<br />
The Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> had tried to<br />
widen the road west by levering at the<br />
American linchpin in the Monschau<br />
area, by cutting toward the Elsenborn<br />
Ridge via Krinkelt-Rocherath, and by<br />
chopping at Butgenbach in an attempt<br />
to roll back the V Corps’ west flank, but<br />
the entire effort had been fruitless and<br />
its cost dear. Having failed to free the<br />
right wing of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, the<br />
higher German commands gave the ball<br />
to the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> and perforce<br />
accepted the narrow zone of advance in<br />
the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> sector which gave<br />
two instead of the originally scheduled<br />
four main roads for its drive west. Be<br />
it added that the northernmost of the<br />
two remaining roads w<strong>as</strong> under Ameri-<br />
can artillery fire for most of its length.<br />
It cannot be said that the Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> clearly had written off the possi-<br />
bility of overrunning the Elsenborn<br />
Ridge. The attacks by the German right<br />
wing had dwindled away by 24 De-<br />
cember because of sheer fatigue, heavy<br />
losses, the withdrawal of most of the<br />
German armor, the feeling on the part<br />
of the army staff that it would be best<br />
to wait for further successes in the south<br />
before going out on a limb, and the<br />
desire to withhold sufficient strength to<br />
meet any American counterattack di-<br />
rected from the Elsenborn area against<br />
the shoulder of the salient. Furthermore,<br />
on 24 or 25 December, Hitler dropped<br />
the plan for the secondary attack by the<br />
Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong> toward Ma<strong>as</strong>tricht and<br />
Heerlen, which had been intended to<br />
<strong>as</strong>sist the Sixth Panzer drive after the
604 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
latter got rolling.<br />
But t<strong>here</strong> still were five German divi-<br />
sions in this sector under Hitzfeld’s<br />
LXVII Corps, the corps maintaining a<br />
front whose boundaries coincided al-<br />
most exactly with those of the American<br />
V Corps. T<strong>here</strong> could be no further<br />
thought of a drive to Eupen and the<br />
establishment of a blocking cordon west<br />
of that point; this mission had been<br />
scrubbed when the l<strong>as</strong>t attacks at<br />
Monschau collapsed. Nor w<strong>as</strong> t<strong>here</strong> hope<br />
that the right wing of the Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> could be set in motion at this<br />
date, the armor already having been<br />
shifted to beef up the advance on the<br />
left. Hitzfeld’s t<strong>as</strong>k w<strong>as</strong> to defend, to<br />
hold the shoulder; but his line, bent in<br />
a sharp right angle near Wirtzfeld, w<strong>as</strong><br />
expensive in manpower and tactically<br />
poor. On Model’s order Hitzfeld and<br />
his division commanders ran a map<br />
exercise on 26 December whose solution<br />
w<strong>as</strong> this: the angle at Wirtzfeld must<br />
be straightened and the line shortened.<br />
The powerful groupment of American<br />
artillery on Elsenborn Ridge constituted<br />
an ever-present threat; t<strong>here</strong>fore this<br />
ground should be taken. Four divi-<br />
sions, it w<strong>as</strong> planned, would attack to<br />
achieve this solution.<br />
Meanwhile the main German advance<br />
w<strong>as</strong> having trouble. The B<strong>as</strong>togne road<br />
center continued in American hands,<br />
greatly hampering the development of<br />
the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> attack. The for-<br />
ward wing of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
had collided with the American defenses<br />
along the line of the Ambléve and<br />
Salm Rivers but had failed to gain<br />
maneuver room and w<strong>as</strong> proceeding on<br />
a dangerously narrow front. Every mo-<br />
bile or semimobile unit which could be<br />
found would have to be thrown into<br />
the main advance. The <strong>Army</strong> Group B<br />
commander, acting on Hitler’s order,<br />
took the 3d Panzer Grenadier Division<br />
out of the LXVII Corps and told Hitz-<br />
feld to abandon his planned attack<br />
against the strong Elsenborn Ridge posi-<br />
tion. The corps w<strong>as</strong> left a limited t<strong>as</strong>k,<br />
to iron out the Wirtzfeld angle.<br />
Finally, on 28 December, Hitzfeld<br />
w<strong>as</strong> ready, but his <strong>as</strong>sault force now rep-<br />
resented only parts of two divisions,<br />
the 12th Volks Grenadier Division and<br />
the 246th. Early that morning two bat-<br />
talions of the 352d Regiment (246th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division) moved out<br />
of the woods near Rocherath against<br />
the forward lines of the 99th Infantry<br />
Division on the Elsenborn Ridge. This<br />
attack w<strong>as</strong> blown to pieces by accurate<br />
shelling from the batteries on the ridge.<br />
A battalion of the 48th Regiment (12th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division) met an<br />
identical fate when it started toward<br />
the 2d Infantry Division position north-<br />
west of Wirtzfeld. Two battalions from<br />
the 27th Regiment (12th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division) took a crack at the 1st<br />
Infantry Division front in the Butgen-<br />
bach sector, but intense rocket fire and<br />
shellfire failed to shake the defenders<br />
and left their supporting artillery un-<br />
scathed. The German <strong>as</strong>sault battal-<br />
ions had not even deployed from ap-<br />
proach march formation when a rain of<br />
bursting shells scattered them in every<br />
direction. A handful of riflemen and<br />
engineers reached a draw leading to the<br />
American foxhole line only to be cap-<br />
tured or driven off. This w<strong>as</strong> the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
attack against the American forces ar-<br />
rayed on the north shoulder. Hitzfeld<br />
w<strong>as</strong> left to hold what he could of his<br />
lengthy front with a force which by the<br />
close of December had dwindled to
THE BATTLE BETWEEN THE SALM AND THE OURTHE 605<br />
three understrength divisions.<br />
The German High Command and the<br />
troops of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> now<br />
waited apprehensively and hopelessly<br />
for the retaliatory blow to fall. That<br />
the American attack would come in a<br />
matter of hours or a very few days w<strong>as</strong><br />
clear to all. W<strong>here</strong> it would be delivered<br />
along the length of the north flank of the<br />
Ardennes salient w<strong>as</strong> a good deal less<br />
certain. A few of the German leaders<br />
seem to have anticipated originally that<br />
the Allied counterattack would come<br />
from north and south against the b<strong>as</strong>e<br />
of the salient, but by the end of De-<br />
cember intelligence reports definitely<br />
ruled out any Allied build-up at the<br />
shoulders of the salient. The Sixth Pan-<br />
zer <strong>Army</strong> staff, acutely aware of the<br />
weakened condition of the German<br />
troops in the Malmédy sector, w<strong>as</strong> appre-<br />
hensive that the Allied effort would be<br />
made t<strong>here</strong> in a drive through to St.<br />
Vith, and set two ordnance companies<br />
scrambling to re-create a single opera-<br />
tional tank company from the armored<br />
debris the 1st SS Panzer Division had<br />
brought out of the La Gleize debacle.<br />
What Rundstedt and Model expected<br />
of their adversary can never be known,<br />
although their respective staffs seem to<br />
have read into Patton’s battle around<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne a strong indication that the<br />
poised Allied pincers would close some-<br />
w<strong>here</strong> in the vicinity of Houffalize. It<br />
is known, however, how Rundstedt re-<br />
garded the Allied strategy which on 3<br />
January sent the American divisions at-<br />
tacking from north and south to snip<br />
off the tip of the salient at Houffalize:<br />
this w<strong>as</strong>, says the OB WEST War Diary,<br />
“the small solution.”
CHAPTER XXIV<br />
The Third <strong>Army</strong> <strong>Of</strong>fensive<br />
Widening the B<strong>as</strong>togne Corridor<br />
When the 4th Armored tanks reached<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne perimeter on 26 December,<br />
the contact between McAuliffe’s<br />
command and the Third <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
dramatic and satisfying but none too<br />
secure 1 . The road now opened from<br />
Assenois to B<strong>as</strong>togne could be traversed<br />
under armed convoy, and for the moment<br />
the Germans in this sector were<br />
too demoralized by the speed and sharpness<br />
of the blow to react in any aggressive<br />
manner. The two main highways<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t and west of the Assenois corridor,<br />
however, still were barred by the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> and such small detachments<br />
<strong>as</strong> could be hurriedly stripped<br />
from the German circle around B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
Continued access to B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
would have to be insured by widening<br />
the breach and securing the Arlon highway-and<br />
perhaps that from Neufchâteau<br />
<strong>as</strong> well-before the enemy could<br />
react to seal the puncture with his<br />
armor. (Map X)<br />
The main weight of Gaffey’s 4th<br />
Armored, it will be recalled, lay to the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Assenois on the Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
axis. On the right of the 4th Armored<br />
the 26th Infantry Division w<strong>as</strong> echeloned<br />
to the southe<strong>as</strong>t and on 26 December<br />
had put troops over the Sure River,<br />
1 The 4th Armored attack toward B<strong>as</strong>togne is<br />
described in Chapter XXI, pp. 523–32, 547–55.<br />
but the only direct tactical effect this<br />
division could have on the fight south of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne would be to threaten the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> line of communications<br />
and divert German reserves. 2 The gap<br />
between the 26th Infantry and the 4th<br />
Armored Divisions, rather tenuously<br />
screened by the 6th Cavalry Squadron,<br />
would be filled by the 35th Infantry<br />
Division (Maj. Gen. Paul Baade) , which<br />
had just come up from Metz and had<br />
orders to attack across the Sure on 27<br />
December. 3 If all went well this attack<br />
would break out to the Lutrebois-Har-<br />
lange road, which fed into the Arlon<br />
highway, and proceed thence abre<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
the 4th Armored.<br />
West of the Assenois corridor the left<br />
wing of Gaffey’s command w<strong>as</strong> screened,<br />
2 The earlier operations of the 26th Division on<br />
the right flank of the III Corps are discussed in<br />
Chapter XXI. pp. 540–47.<br />
3 The 35th Division had suffered heavily in the<br />
Lorraine battles (for which see Cole, The Lorraine<br />
Campaign, ch. XII, p<strong>as</strong>sim) and General Gay<br />
persuaded Patton not to throw the division into<br />
the Ardennes fight until other Third <strong>Army</strong> divi-<br />
sions in better condition had been committed.<br />
(The AAR’s of the 35th Division in the early<br />
ph<strong>as</strong>es of the Ardennes are so abbreviated <strong>as</strong> to<br />
be practically useless. Fortunately the story is<br />
told in considerable detail in the combat inter-<br />
views. The published histories of the division’s<br />
activities are very good. See Miltonberger and<br />
Huston, 134th Infantry Regiment: Combat <strong>History</strong><br />
of World War II (W<strong>as</strong>hington, n.d.); Combat<br />
<strong>History</strong> of the 134th Infantry Regiment (Baton<br />
Rouge, 1946); and The 35th Infantry Division in<br />
World War II (Atlanta, n.d.).
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 607<br />
but rather lightly, by scratch forces that<br />
General Middleton had gat<strong>here</strong>d from<br />
his VIII Corps troops and what remained<br />
of Cota’s 28th Division. On the after-<br />
noon of 26 December General Patton<br />
<strong>as</strong>signed CCA, 9th Armored, which w<strong>as</strong><br />
near Luxembourg City, to the III<br />
Corps with orders that it be attached<br />
to the 4th Armored and attack on the<br />
left to open the Neufchâteau-B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
highway. The 9th Armored Division’s<br />
CCA w<strong>as</strong> relieved that same afternoon<br />
by CCA of Maj. Gen. Robert W. Grow’s<br />
6th Armored Division.<br />
Although the enemy troops around<br />
Assenois had been broken and scattered<br />
by the lightning thrust on the 26th,<br />
the III Corps’ attack on the following<br />
day met some opposition. The 35th<br />
Division, its ultimate objective the Long-<br />
villy-B<strong>as</strong>togne road, had more trouble<br />
with terrain and weather than with<br />
Germans, for the enemy had elected to<br />
make a stand on a series of hills some<br />
five thousand yards beyond the Sure.<br />
On the left the 137th Infantry (Col.<br />
William S. Murray) trucked through<br />
the 4th Armored, crossed the tankers’<br />
bridge at Tintange, and moved out cross-<br />
country in snow six inches deep. The<br />
2d Battalion drove off the German out-<br />
post at the crossroads village of Surré,<br />
but to the west the 3d Battalion, de-<br />
filing along a draw near Livarchamps,<br />
came suddenly under fire from a pillbox<br />
which checked further movement. The<br />
320th Infantry (Col. Bernard A. Byrne)<br />
had to make its own crossings at the<br />
Sure, one company wading the icy river,<br />
but Boulaide and B<strong>as</strong>chleiden, on the<br />
single road in the regimental zone, were<br />
occupied without a c<strong>as</strong>ualty. Thence the<br />
3d Battalion pushed on toward the north.<br />
In the 4th Armored zone CCR<br />
shepherded trucks on the Assenois road<br />
while CCB and CCA continued the foot-<br />
slogging pace north toward B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
The armored infantry and the two rifle<br />
battalions of the 3 18th marched through<br />
the snow, fighting in those woods and<br />
hamlets w<strong>here</strong> the German grenadiers<br />
and paratroopers–now with virtually no<br />
artillery to back them up–decided to<br />
make a stand. CCB made its attack from<br />
west of Hompré against troops of the<br />
15th Panzer Grenadier Division, <strong>here</strong><br />
faced about from B<strong>as</strong>togne; by nightfall<br />
its patrols had reached the 101st Air-<br />
borne perimeter. CCA, farther from<br />
the point of impact on 26 December,<br />
had a rougher time although the com-<br />
manders of the two battalions from the<br />
15th Parachute Regiment confronting<br />
the Americans had been captured in<br />
battle the previous day. When the 51st<br />
Armored Infantry Battalion moved to-<br />
ward the village of Sainlez, perched on<br />
a hill to the front, the enemy para-<br />
troopers made such good use of their<br />
commanding position that the Shermans<br />
had to enter the action and partially<br />
destroy the village before the German<br />
hold w<strong>as</strong> broken. The defenders flushed<br />
from Sainlez moved e<strong>as</strong>t and struck the<br />
1st Battalion of the 318th, which had<br />
cleared Livarchamps, in the rear, start-<br />
ing a fire fight that l<strong>as</strong>ted into the<br />
night. American battle c<strong>as</strong>ualties in this<br />
sector were high on the 27th, and about<br />
an equal number of frost bite c<strong>as</strong>es<br />
plagued the infantrymen who had now<br />
spent six days in the snow and wet.<br />
While the 4th Armored and its at-<br />
tached troops pressed forward to touch<br />
hands with the B<strong>as</strong>togne garrison, the<br />
perimeter itself remained in unwonted<br />
quiet. General Taylor went into the<br />
city to congratulate McAuliffe and re-
SUPPLIES MOVING THROUGH BASTOGNE
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE<br />
sume command of his division. 4 Supply<br />
trucks and replacements for the 101st<br />
rolled through the shell-torn streets. A<br />
medical collecting company arrived to<br />
move the c<strong>as</strong>ualties back to corps hospi-<br />
tals and by noon of the 28th the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
stretcher c<strong>as</strong>e had left the city. Perhaps<br />
the most depressing burden the defense<br />
had had to bear during the siege w<strong>as</strong><br />
the large number of seriously wounded<br />
and the lack of medical facilities for<br />
their care. As early <strong>as</strong> 21 December the<br />
division surgeon had estimated the<br />
101st c<strong>as</strong>ualty list <strong>as</strong> about thirteen hun-<br />
dred, of whom a hundred and fifty were<br />
seriously wounded and required sur-<br />
gery. As this situation worsened the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> chief of staff, General Gay,<br />
made plans on his own responsibility<br />
to move surgeons into B<strong>as</strong>togne under<br />
a white flag, but the successful flight of<br />
the Third <strong>Army</strong> surgeons sent in by<br />
liaison plane on the 25th and by glider<br />
on the 26th changed the plans and did<br />
much to alleviate the suffering in the<br />
cellar hospitals of B<strong>as</strong>togne. The c<strong>as</strong>ual-<br />
ties finally evacuated numbered 964;<br />
about 700 German prisoners were also<br />
sent out of the city.<br />
Uncertainty <strong>as</strong> to the tenure of the<br />
ground corridor resulted in a contin-<br />
uation of the airlift on the 27th. This<br />
time 130 cargo planes and 32 gliders<br />
essayed the mission, but by now the<br />
German ack-ack w<strong>as</strong> alert and zeroed<br />
in on the paths of approach. Most of<br />
the gliders landed safely, but the cargo<br />
planes carrying parapacks suffered heavi-<br />
ly on the turnaround over the perimeter;<br />
of thirteen C–47’s sent out by the 440th<br />
Troop Carrier Group only four returned<br />
to their b<strong>as</strong>e.<br />
4 Cf. Chapter XIX.<br />
609<br />
During the morning of 28 December<br />
it became apparent that the German<br />
units in front of the III Corps were<br />
stiffening. The 35th Division gained very<br />
little ground, particularly on the right.<br />
On the left the 137th Infantry made<br />
slow going over broken ground and<br />
through underbrush, the bushes and<br />
scrub trees detonating percussion mis-<br />
siles before they could land on the Ger-<br />
man positions. The 3d Battalion, pinned<br />
down in the ravine in column of com-<br />
panies, took nearly all day to work<br />
around the irritating pillbox, which fi-<br />
nally w<strong>as</strong> destroyed. Thus far the 35th<br />
Division, filled with untrained replace-<br />
ments, w<strong>as</strong> attacking without its usual<br />
supporting battalion of tanks, for these<br />
had been taken away while the division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> refitting at Metz.<br />
Meanwhile General Earnest, com-<br />
manding CCA of the 4th Armored, had<br />
become concerned with the failure of<br />
the 35th to draw abre<strong>as</strong>t on his open<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t flank, particularly since the rifle bat-<br />
talion borrowed from the 80th Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> under orders to rejoin its parent<br />
formation. He t<strong>here</strong>fore <strong>as</strong>ked that the<br />
reserve regiment of the 35th (134th<br />
Infantry) be put into the attack on his<br />
right, with the object of taking<br />
Lutrebois, a village e<strong>as</strong>t of the Arlon<br />
highway. During the night of the 28th<br />
the 134th Infantry (Col. Butler B.<br />
Miltonberger) relieved the tired troops<br />
from the 8oth, taking attack positions<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Hompré. The orders were to<br />
push any German resistance to the right<br />
(that is, away from the Arlon road);<br />
thus insensibly the 35th Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
turning to face northe<strong>as</strong>t instead of north<br />
with the 320th behind the 137th and<br />
the 137th falling into position behind<br />
the 134th. This columnar array would
610<br />
have considerable effect on the conduct<br />
of the ensuing battle.<br />
The Opposing Grand Tactics<br />
By Christm<strong>as</strong> Day it w<strong>as</strong> apparent in<br />
both the Allied and German head-<br />
quarters that the Ardennes battle had<br />
entered a new ph<strong>as</strong>e and that events<br />
now afoot required a fresh look at the<br />
grand tactics to be applied <strong>as</strong> the year<br />
drew to its close.<br />
The Allied commanders had from the<br />
very first agreed in principle that the<br />
ultimate objective w<strong>as</strong> to seize the in-<br />
itiative, er<strong>as</strong>e the German salient, and<br />
set an offensive in motion to cross the<br />
Rhine. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> division in the<br />
Allied camp, however, <strong>as</strong> to when a<br />
counteroffensive should be launched and<br />
w<strong>here</strong> it should strike into the salient.<br />
Beyond this, of course, lay the old argu-<br />
ment <strong>as</strong> to whether the final attack across<br />
the Rhine should be on a wide or<br />
narrow front, in the British or in the<br />
American sector. 5<br />
On 25 December the commanders of<br />
the two army groups whose troops faced<br />
the Germans in the Ardennes met<br />
at Montgomery’s Belgian headquarters.<br />
General Bradley, whose divisions already<br />
were counterattacking, felt that the<br />
5 This controversy <strong>as</strong> to Allied strategy is well<br />
treated in Pogue, The Supreme Command, pp.<br />
312–17. Montgomery’s strategy h<strong>as</strong> had a number<br />
of defenders, but in the main they have produced<br />
more heat than light. One of the ablest is<br />
Reginald William Thompson whose The Battle<br />
for the Rhineland (London: Hutchinson, 1958)<br />
advances the thesis that Montgomery’s attitude<br />
throughout the Ardennes campaign w<strong>as</strong> governed<br />
by the military principle of the “maintenance of<br />
the objective,” that is, the retention of forces<br />
(British and Canadian) in a posture which would<br />
permit a rapid resumption of the battle for the<br />
Rhineland.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
German drive had lost its momentum<br />
and that now w<strong>as</strong> the moment to l<strong>as</strong>h<br />
back at the attackers, from the north <strong>as</strong><br />
well <strong>as</strong> the south. Field Marshal Mont-<br />
gomery w<strong>as</strong> a good deal less optimistic.<br />
In his view the enemy still retained the<br />
capability to breach the First <strong>Army</strong> front<br />
(a view shared by the First <strong>Army</strong> G–<br />
2, who w<strong>as</strong> concerned with two fresh<br />
German armored divisions believed to<br />
be moving into the Malmédy sector);<br />
the American infantry divisions were<br />
woefully understrength; tank losses had<br />
been very high; in sum, <strong>as</strong> Montgomery<br />
saw it, the First <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> very tired<br />
and incapable of offensive action.<br />
Bradley w<strong>as</strong> distressed by Montgomery’s<br />
attitude and the very next day wrote a<br />
personal letter to his old friend, the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> commander, carefully under-<br />
scoring the field marshal’s authority over<br />
Hodges’ army but making crystal clear<br />
that he, Bradley, did not view the sit-<br />
uation “in <strong>as</strong> grave a light <strong>as</strong> Marshal<br />
Montgomery.” As Bradley saw it the<br />
German losses had been very high and<br />
“if we could seize the initiative, I be-<br />
lieve he would have to get out in a<br />
hurry.” The advice to Hodges, then,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to study the battle with an eye to<br />
pushing the enemy back “<strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong><br />
the situation seems to warrant.”<br />
Perhaps, after Bradley’s visit, the field<br />
marshal felt that he should set the<br />
record straight at SHAEF. After a long<br />
visit with Hodges on the 26th, he sent<br />
a message to Eisenhower saying that<br />
“at present” he could not p<strong>as</strong>s to the<br />
offensive, that the west flank of the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong> continued under pressure,<br />
and that more troops would be needed<br />
to wrest the initiative from the Germans.<br />
At the moment, however, the Supreme<br />
Commander w<strong>as</strong> concerned more with
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE<br />
the slowness of the Third <strong>Army</strong> drive<br />
(earlier General Patton had called twice<br />
to apologize for the delay in reaching<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne) than with an enlargement of<br />
the Allied counterattack. In the daily<br />
SHAEF staff meeting on the morning of<br />
the 26th Eisenhower ruled that<br />
General Devers would have to redress<br />
the lines of his 6th <strong>Army</strong> Group by a<br />
general withdrawal to the Vosges, t<strong>here</strong>-<br />
after joining his flank to the French<br />
north of Colmar. Such regrouping, dis-<br />
t<strong>as</strong>teful <strong>as</strong> it w<strong>as</strong>, would free two or<br />
three American divisions for use in the<br />
Ardennes. (It would seem that the<br />
SHAEF staff approved the withdrawal<br />
of Devers’ forces-all save Air Marshal<br />
Tedder who did not think the with-<br />
drawal justified and argued that Mont-<br />
gomery had British and Canadian divi-<br />
sions which could be freed to provide<br />
the needed SHAEF reserve.) 6<br />
The lower echelon of Allied com-<br />
manders w<strong>as</strong> meanwhile stirring restive-<br />
ly. Having reached B<strong>as</strong>togne late on the<br />
26th, Patton set his staff to work on<br />
plans for a prompt redirection of the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> attack. On the 27th<br />
General Collins arrived at the First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> command post with three plans<br />
for an attack led by the VII Corps,<br />
two aimed at a junction with Patton<br />
in the B<strong>as</strong>togne sector, one with St. Vith,<br />
deeper in the salient, <strong>as</strong> the objective.<br />
Collins’ proposals posed the problem<br />
of grand tactics now at issue-should<br />
the German salient be pushed back from<br />
the tip or should it be cut off close to<br />
the shoulders-but it remained for<br />
Patton, the diligent student of mili-<br />
tary history, to state in forthright terms<br />
6 Robb Notes; Bradley, A Soldier’s Story, p. 480;<br />
Hq 12th <strong>Army</strong> Group, <strong>Military</strong> Objectives, file<br />
371.3, vol. IV.<br />
611<br />
the cl<strong>as</strong>sic but venturesome solution.<br />
Arguing from the experiences of World<br />
War I, the Third <strong>Army</strong> commander held<br />
that the Ardennes salient should be cut<br />
off and the German armies engulfed<br />
t<strong>here</strong>in by a vise closing from north<br />
and south against the shoulders of the<br />
Bulge. Thus the Third <strong>Army</strong> would<br />
move northe<strong>as</strong>t from Luxembourg City<br />
toward Bitburg and Prüm along what<br />
the Third <strong>Army</strong> staff called the “Honey-<br />
moon Trail.” General Smith, the<br />
SHAEF chief of staff, w<strong>as</strong> in agreement<br />
with this solution, <strong>as</strong> were Hodges,<br />
Gerow, and Collins-in principle. The<br />
salient at its shoulders w<strong>as</strong> forty miles<br />
across, however, and a successful amputa-<br />
tion would necessitate rapid action by<br />
strong armored forces moving f<strong>as</strong>t along<br />
a good road net. The First <strong>Army</strong> com-<br />
manders, <strong>as</strong> a result, had to give<br />
over this solution because the road<br />
complex southe<strong>as</strong>t of the Elsenborn<br />
Ridge, which would be the natural First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> axis for a cleaving blow at the<br />
German shoulder, could not sustain a<br />
large attack force heavy in armor-<br />
hence Collins’ compromise suggestion<br />
for an attack from a point north of<br />
Malmédy toward St. Vith. 7<br />
How would the two army group com-<br />
manders react to the pressures being<br />
brought to bear by their subordinates?<br />
Bradley w<strong>as</strong> concerned with the vagaries<br />
of the winter weather, which could<br />
slow any counterattack to a walk, and<br />
by the lack of reserves. He may also<br />
have been uncertain of his air support.<br />
Bad flying weather w<strong>as</strong> a distinct possi-<br />
bility, and the Eighth Air Force-a<br />
rather independent command–w<strong>as</strong> in-<br />
cre<strong>as</strong>ingly disenchanted with its battle-<br />
7 Sylvan Diary; Gay Diary; Robb Notes.
612<br />
field missions over the Ardennes (in-<br />
deed, on 27 December the Eighth Air<br />
Force had stated its intention of scrub-<br />
bing the battle zone targets and going<br />
after the Leipzig oil depots, weather per-<br />
mitting) . Bradley decided t<strong>here</strong>fore to<br />
settle for half a loaf and on the 27th<br />
briefed the Supreme Commander on a<br />
new Third <strong>Army</strong> attack to be mounted<br />
from the B<strong>as</strong>togne area and to drive<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t toward St. Vith. Bradley w<strong>as</strong><br />
careful to add that this plan w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
Patton’s concept of a drive against the<br />
south shoulder.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> remained Montgomery’s deci-<br />
sion. By the 27th he w<strong>as</strong> ready to con-<br />
sider definite counterattack plans. When<br />
this word w<strong>as</strong> relayed to Eisenhower at<br />
his daily staff meeting it elicited from<br />
him a heartfelt “Praise God from Whom<br />
all blessings flow!” and the Supreme<br />
Commander set off at once to meet the<br />
field marshal in Brussels. Hodges, Col-<br />
lins, and Ridgway did their best in the<br />
meantime to convince Montgomery that<br />
the First <strong>Army</strong> attack should be initi-<br />
ated not around Celles, <strong>as</strong> the field mar-<br />
shal had first proposed, but farther to<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t. On the evening of 28 December<br />
Eisenhower phoned General Smith from<br />
Brussels and told him that he saw great<br />
possibilities in a thrust through the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne-Houffalize area. As it turned<br />
out, this would be the maneuver ulti-<br />
mately adopted. Perhaps the field mar-<br />
shal had given Eisenhower re<strong>as</strong>on to<br />
think that the First <strong>Army</strong> would make<br />
its play in a drive on Houffalize; per-<br />
haps-and this seems more likely-Mont-<br />
gomery still had not made any final<br />
decision <strong>as</strong> to the place w<strong>here</strong> the coun-<br />
terattack would be delivered. Certainly<br />
no time had been set although 4 and 5<br />
January had been discussed <strong>as</strong> possible<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
target dates. Hodges and Collins con-<br />
tinued to press for a decision to get the<br />
attack from the north flank rolling–the<br />
prospects for which brightened when the<br />
British offered the loan of two hundred<br />
medium tanks. Meanwhile the new<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> attack against the south<br />
flank commenced. On the l<strong>as</strong>t day of<br />
December, the serious prospect of bad<br />
weather outweighed by the fact that the<br />
Germans were thinning the First <strong>Army</strong><br />
front to face the Third, Montgomery<br />
gave his decision and Hodges consented:<br />
the VII Corps, followed by the XVIII<br />
Airborne Corps, would attack toward<br />
Houffalize and St. Vith respectively on<br />
3 January. 8<br />
Eisenhower’s telephone call from<br />
Brussels on the 28th rele<strong>as</strong>ed the 11th<br />
Armored and 87th Infantry Divisions<br />
from the SHAEF reserve for use by<br />
Bradley. That night Patton met with<br />
the VIII and III Corps command-<br />
ers to lay out the new plan for contin-<br />
uation of the Third <strong>Army</strong> attack. Mid-<br />
dleton’s VIII Corps would jump off<br />
from the B<strong>as</strong>togne area on the morning<br />
of 30 December, its objective the high<br />
ground and road nexus just south of<br />
Houffalize. Millikin’s III Corps would<br />
move into the attack on 31 December,<br />
driving in the direction of St. Vith. The<br />
initial pressure on the salient would<br />
be exerted much farther to the west<br />
than Patton wished. Bradley made dou-<br />
bly sure that the Third <strong>Army</strong> would in-<br />
deed place its weight <strong>as</strong> planned by<br />
telling Patton that the two fresh divi-<br />
sions could be employed only by the<br />
VIII Corps. But the Third <strong>Army</strong> com-<br />
8 Manteuffel argues that the American counter-<br />
attack began prematurely; see Freidin and Richard-<br />
son, eds., Fatal Decisions, p. 290.
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 613<br />
mander put his cherished concept into<br />
the army operations order by means of<br />
a paragraph which called for the XII<br />
Corps to be prepared for an attack<br />
across the Sauer River and northe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
through the Prüm valley-ultimate ob-<br />
jective the Rhine River crossings at<br />
Bonn <strong>as</strong> the entire Third <strong>Army</strong> swung<br />
northe<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
On Christm<strong>as</strong> Day the German com-<br />
manders sensed, <strong>as</strong> their opponents<br />
across the line had done, that they were<br />
at a turning point in the Ardennes bat-<br />
tle. How should the higher command-<br />
ers now intervene to influence the<br />
course of battle, or, more accurately,<br />
could they intervene? Manteuffel’s plan<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to make the suit fit the cloth: put<br />
enough new troops in to take B<strong>as</strong>togne,<br />
then swing the left flank of the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> toward the Meuse and<br />
fight the Allies e<strong>as</strong>t of the river–the<br />
old Small Solution. Field Marshal Mo-<br />
del agreed that B<strong>as</strong>togne must be taken<br />
and that additional troops would be<br />
needed for the t<strong>as</strong>k, but the only ar-<br />
mor immediately available w<strong>as</strong> the Fueh-<br />
rer Begleit Brigade and he had just<br />
extricated this unit from the Manhay<br />
fight to give added weight to the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> drive against the Ameri-<br />
can line on the Ourthe River. As it<br />
turned out, Remer’s brigade arrived in<br />
the Ourthe sector only a few hours be-<br />
fore the Americans broke through to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. It had time to put in only<br />
one probing <strong>as</strong>sault when Model, on the<br />
late afternoon of the 26th, sent the<br />
Fuehrer Begleit again on its travels,<br />
this time countermarching to seal the<br />
gap in the B<strong>as</strong>togne ring with a riposte<br />
between Sibret and Hompré.<br />
Model and Rundstedt seem to have<br />
agreed on a plan of action which may<br />
or may not have had the Fuehrer’s ap-<br />
proval (t<strong>here</strong> is no record). The Fifth<br />
and Sixth would seek to destroy the<br />
Allied forces e<strong>as</strong>t of the Meuse while<br />
the Seventh held on <strong>as</strong> best it could; <strong>as</strong><br />
a first step an attack would be made to<br />
eradicate the Americans in the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
area. 9 Obviously the German lines<br />
would have to be shortened somew<strong>here</strong>,<br />
and Model, directly under Hitler’s<br />
baleful eye, dare not surrender ground.<br />
This responsibility fell to the Fifth Pan-<br />
zer <strong>Army</strong> commander, who on 26 De-<br />
cember (with tacit approval from Model<br />
at every step) set about creating a<br />
defensive front in the west roughly fol-<br />
lowing the triangular outline B<strong>as</strong>togne-<br />
Rochefort-Amonines. The battered 2d<br />
Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong> brought back<br />
through the Rochefort bridgehead and<br />
troops from the 9th Panzer took over<br />
from Panzer Lehr in the Rochefort area,<br />
the latter sidestepping toward the south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t so that one flank finally would<br />
lie on the Lesse River with the other<br />
9 The German sources contributing most directly<br />
to this chapter are MSS # B–23, 5th Parachute<br />
Division, 1 December 1944–12 January 1945<br />
(Generalmajor Ludwig Heilmann) ; # B–041,<br />
167th Volks Grenadier Division, 24 December<br />
1944–February 1945, Corps Hoecker, 2–10 March<br />
1945 and 59th Infantry Division, 20 March–24<br />
April 1945 (Generalleutnant Hans Hoecker) ; #<br />
B–068, 3d Panzer Grenadier Division, Ardennes<br />
(Generalmajor Walter Denkert) ; # B–151, Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive (General der<br />
Panzertruppen H<strong>as</strong>so von Manteuffel) ; # B–151a,<br />
sequel to MS # B–151 (General der Panzertruppen<br />
H<strong>as</strong>so von Manteuffel); # B–235, Fifth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, 2 November 1944–16 January 1945 (General-<br />
major Carl Wagener); # B–465, 3d Panzer<br />
Grenadier Division, 16–28 December 1944 (Gen-<br />
eralmajor Walter Denkert) ; # B–592, Fuehrer<br />
Begleit Brigade, 16 December 1944–26 January<br />
1945 (Generalmajor Otto Remer); # B–701, <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group E, 15 October 1944–1945 (Col Guenther<br />
Reichhelm); # B–799. LXXXIX Corps, 24 Janu-<br />
ary–8 March 1945 (Lt Col Kurt Reschke).
614 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
fixed at Remagne, five miles west of<br />
the Neufchâteau-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway. The<br />
LVIII Panzer Corps, possibly <strong>as</strong> a sop<br />
to Hitler, w<strong>as</strong> allowed to continue its<br />
fruitless attacks in the Ourthe sector,<br />
but with the Fuehrer Begleit out of the<br />
picture these quickly dwindled away.<br />
Manteuffel made his old comrade Luet-<br />
twitz responsible for the defensive west-<br />
ern front and took a new corps<br />
headquarters, which had been sent up<br />
from the OKW reserve, to handle the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne operation. This, the XXXIX<br />
Panzer Corps, w<strong>as</strong> commanded by Gen-<br />
eralleutnant Karl Decker, a very experi-<br />
enced officer with a reputation for<br />
prudence combined with determination.<br />
Decker, despite protests by Luettwitz,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> placed under the latter, and for a<br />
few days the German order of battle<br />
would show an “<strong>Army</strong> Group Luett-<br />
witz.”<br />
Manteuffel counted on the Fuehrer<br />
Begleit to carry the main burden of the<br />
counterattack south of B<strong>as</strong>togne. The<br />
brigade had about forty Mark IV tanks<br />
plus an <strong>as</strong>sault gun brigade of thirty<br />
tubes, and its infantry had not been bled<br />
white <strong>as</strong> in the rest of the armored<br />
formations. In addition, Manteuffel had<br />
been promised the beat-up 1st SS Pan-<br />
zer Division, the 3d Panzer Grenadier<br />
Division, and the Fuehrer Grenadier<br />
Brigade, parts of these formations being<br />
scheduled to reach Decker on 28 De-<br />
cember. Advance elements of the Fueh-<br />
rer Begleit did arrive that morning,<br />
taking station in the Bois de Herbai-<br />
mont north of the Marche-B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
road, but the Allied Jabos were in full<br />
cry over the battlefield and Remer could<br />
not bring all his troops forward or issue<br />
from the forest cover. Time w<strong>as</strong> running<br />
out for the Germans. As early <strong>as</strong> the<br />
night of the 27th Rundstedt’s staff be-<br />
lieved that unless Remer could make a<br />
successful attack at once it w<strong>as</strong> “question-<br />
able” whether the B<strong>as</strong>togne gap could<br />
be sealed. Manteuffel later would say<br />
that this job could have been done only<br />
by counterattacking within forty-eight<br />
hours.<br />
On both sides of the hill, then, the<br />
troops were being moved for a set<br />
piece attack on 30 December. Would<br />
either opponent anticipate the ensuing<br />
collision? German intelligence officers<br />
did predict that the 6th Armored Di-<br />
vision soon would appear between the<br />
III and XII Corps. The OB WEST<br />
report of 27 December reads: “It is ex-<br />
pected that the units of the Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
under the energetic leadership of Gen-<br />
eral Patton will make strong attacks<br />
against our south flank.” Within twenty-<br />
four hours this view altered: The First<br />
<strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> said to be having difficulty re-<br />
grouping and still showed defensive ten-<br />
dencies; t<strong>here</strong>fore, even though the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> in position to attack,<br />
it probably would not attack alone. 10<br />
The American intelligence agencies<br />
had practically no knowledge of any<br />
German units except those immediately<br />
in contact. <strong>Of</strong> course some kind of<br />
counterattack w<strong>as</strong> expected, but this, it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> believed, would come when bad<br />
weather cut down friendly air activity.<br />
The weather did turn foul late on the<br />
28th and the word went out in the<br />
American camp: Prepare for an ar-<br />
mored counterattack, enemy tanks are in<br />
movement around B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
10 The German estimate of the opposing forces<br />
and Allied reserves moving into the Ardennes<br />
may be traced in the daily Ic. Feindlagekarten<br />
attached to the OB WEST KTB.
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE<br />
The Sibret-Villeroux Actions<br />
While the Fuehrer Begleit Brigade<br />
w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>sembling, General Kokott did<br />
what he could to gather troops and guns<br />
in the sector west of Assenois and t<strong>here</strong><br />
make some kind of a stand to prevent<br />
the tear in the B<strong>as</strong>togne noose from un-<br />
raveling further. The key villages in<br />
his original defense plans were Sibret<br />
and Villeroux, overwatching <strong>as</strong> they<br />
did the Neufchâteau-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway.<br />
Kokott could expect no help from the<br />
5th Parachute Division, originally en-<br />
trusted with the blocking line in this<br />
area, for on the night of 26 December<br />
an officer patrol reported that not a sin-<br />
gle paratrooper could be found between<br />
Sibret and Assenois. Kokott’s own divi-<br />
sion, the 26th Volks Grenadier, and its<br />
attached battalions from the 15th Pan-<br />
zer Grenadier had taken very heavy<br />
losses during the western attack against<br />
the 101st Airborne on Christm<strong>as</strong> Day.<br />
The rifle companies were down to twenty<br />
or thirty men; most of the regimental<br />
and battalion commanders and executive<br />
officers were dead or wounded; a num-<br />
ber of heavy mortars and antitank guns<br />
had been sent back to the divisional<br />
trains because t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no more am-<br />
munition; and the only rifle replace-<br />
ments now consisted of what Kokott<br />
called “lost clumps” of wandering infan-<br />
try.<br />
When CCA of the 9th Armored Di-<br />
vision (Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> L. Harrold) got its<br />
orders on the 26th to come forward on<br />
the left flank of the 4th Armored and<br />
attack toward Sibret, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> more at<br />
stake than defending the corridor just<br />
opened through the German lines.<br />
General Middleton w<strong>as</strong> already busy<br />
with plans for his VIII Corps to join<br />
615<br />
the Third <strong>Army</strong> attack beyond B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
and, with the memories of the traffic<br />
congestion t<strong>here</strong> early in the fight still<br />
fresh in mind, w<strong>as</strong> most unwilling to<br />
drag the VIII Corps through the B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne knothole in the forthcoming ad-<br />
vance. Middleton convinced Bradley<br />
and Patton that the VIII Corps should<br />
make its drive from a line of departure<br />
west of B<strong>as</strong>togne, and for this the Neuf-<br />
château road first had to be opened and<br />
the enemy driven back to the north-<br />
west.<br />
When CCA started down the Neuf-<br />
château road on the morning of the 27th,<br />
it faced a catch-<strong>as</strong>-catch-can fight; no<br />
one knew w<strong>here</strong> the enemy might be<br />
found or in what strength. T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Collins (Lt. Col. Kenneth W. Collins),<br />
in the lead, w<strong>as</strong> held up some hours<br />
by mines which had been laid north<br />
of Vaux-lez-Rosières during the VIII<br />
Corps’ withdrawal; so T<strong>as</strong>k Force Kar-<br />
steter (Lt. Col. Burton W. Karsteter)<br />
circled to head for Villeroux, leaving<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Collins to take Sibret. Kar-<br />
steter, who had two medium tank com-<br />
panies, got into Villeroux, but night w<strong>as</strong><br />
coming and the tanks were not risked<br />
inside the village. Collins sent his single<br />
company of Shermans into Sibret, firing<br />
at everything in sight. The Americans<br />
could not be said to hold the village,<br />
however, for a small detachment of the<br />
104th Panzer Grenadier Regiment w<strong>as</strong><br />
determined to make a fight of it and<br />
did. It took all night to drive the Ger-<br />
man grenadiers out of the cellars and<br />
ruined houses.<br />
During the night of 27 December<br />
the Germans put more men into Ville-<br />
roux (the 39th Regiment w<strong>as</strong> slowly<br />
building up a semblance of a front)<br />
but to no avail. American artillery and
616 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Allied fighter-bombers shattered the vil-<br />
lage, and Karsteter finished the job with<br />
his tanks. T<strong>as</strong>k Force Collins w<strong>as</strong> de-<br />
layed on the 28th by a formidable<br />
ground haze which lingered around<br />
Sibret all morning. Halfway to its next<br />
objective, the crossroads at Chenogne<br />
north of Sibret, the American column<br />
came under enfilading fire from a<br />
small wood lot close to the road. The<br />
tank company turned to deal with this<br />
menace and finally suppressed the Ger-<br />
man fire, but light w<strong>as</strong> fading and the<br />
column laagered w<strong>here</strong> it w<strong>as</strong>.<br />
In the meantime General Kokott had<br />
gat<strong>here</strong>d a counterattack force, a com-<br />
pany of the division Pioneers, to retake<br />
Sibret. While at breakf<strong>as</strong>t on the 29th<br />
eating K rations on the tank decks and<br />
in foxholes beside the road, Collins’<br />
troops suddenly saw a body of men<br />
march out of the nearby woods. An<br />
American captain shouted out and the<br />
leading figure replied, “Good morning”<br />
-in German. The Americans cut loose<br />
with every weapon, to such effect that<br />
some fifty dead Germans were counted,<br />
lying in column formation <strong>as</strong> they had<br />
fallen. Late in the day, however, the<br />
fortunes of war turned against the Amer-<br />
icans. Collins’ tanks had moved through<br />
the village square in Chenogne and<br />
were approaching a road junction when<br />
high velocity shells knocked out the<br />
two lead tanks. Then, in a sharp ex-<br />
change of shots, the enemy gunners<br />
accounted for two more of the Shermans,<br />
and the Americans withdrew. They<br />
could not discover the exact enemy lo-<br />
cations in the twilight but were sure<br />
they were facing tanks. That night, the<br />
VIII Corps artillery reported, it “blew<br />
Chenogne apart.”<br />
While T<strong>as</strong>k Force Collins w<strong>as</strong> en-<br />
gaged on the road to Chenogne, T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Karsteter also w<strong>as</strong> moving north,<br />
its objective Senonchamps, the scene of<br />
hard fighting in previous days and a<br />
sally port onto the main road running<br />
west from B<strong>as</strong>togne to Marche. Here<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Karsteter w<strong>as</strong> unwittingly<br />
threatening the <strong>as</strong>sembly area of the<br />
Fuehrer Begleit which lay in the woods<br />
north of the highway, none too securely<br />
screened by remnants of the 3d Bat-<br />
talion of the 104th Panzer Grenadier<br />
around Chenogne. Remer’s brigade al-<br />
ready had taken some share in the action<br />
against CCA and one of his 105-mm.<br />
flak pieces w<strong>as</strong> responsible for holding<br />
up T<strong>as</strong>k Force Collins in the fight at<br />
the roadside woods, continuing in ac-<br />
tion until it w<strong>as</strong> rammed by a Sherman<br />
tank.<br />
Not far out of Villeroux, T<strong>as</strong>k Force<br />
Karsteter came under hot and heavy fire<br />
from the Bois de Fragotte, lying over<br />
to the northwest. What the Americans<br />
had run into w<strong>as</strong> the main body of the<br />
3d Panzer Grenadier Division. Losses<br />
among the armored infantry were very<br />
high, and that night a liaison officer<br />
reported that the t<strong>as</strong>k force front w<strong>as</strong><br />
“disorganized.” Four of Karsteter’s tanks<br />
ran the gauntlet of fire from the woods<br />
and entered Senonchamps, but the in-<br />
fantry failed to follow. The cumulative<br />
losses sustained by CCA in the three-<br />
day operation had been severe and it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> down to a company and a half of<br />
infantry, although 21 medium and 17<br />
light tanks still were operable. 11<br />
11 During this battle Sgt. T. J. Dawson, Com-<br />
pany C. 19th Tank Battalion, w<strong>as</strong> killed by a direct<br />
artillery hit while attempting to rescue the crew<br />
members from his burning tank. He w<strong>as</strong> awarded<br />
the DSC posthumously.
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE<br />
The Two Attacks Collide<br />
The grand tactics of the two oppo-<br />
nents had been solved–at le<strong>as</strong>t on the<br />
planning maps–by set-piece attacks in<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne sector which were sched-<br />
uled to commence on or about 30 De-<br />
cember. This date w<strong>as</strong> firm insofar <strong>as</strong><br />
the American Third <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> con-<br />
cerned. In the German camp the date<br />
w<strong>as</strong> contingent on the caprices of the<br />
weather, traffic congestion on the roads<br />
running into the area, the damage which<br />
might be inflicted by the Allied fighter-<br />
bombers, and the uncertainty attached<br />
to the arrival of fuel trucks coming for-<br />
ward from the Rhine dumps. The two<br />
attacks nevertheless would be launched<br />
on 30 December.<br />
The Forces and the Plans<br />
Middleton’s VIII Corps, scheduled to<br />
provide the American curtain-raiser<br />
thrust on the left wing of Patton’s army,<br />
took control of the 101st Airborne Di-<br />
vision and the 9th Armored Division the<br />
evening before the attack began. Al-<br />
though General Taylor’s paratroopers<br />
and glider infantry would play no offen-<br />
sive role in the first stages of the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> operation, they had to hold the<br />
pivot position at B<strong>as</strong>togne and provide<br />
couverture <strong>as</strong> the scheme of maneuver<br />
unfolded. <strong>Of</strong> the 9th Armored com-<br />
mands only CCA, already committed,<br />
could be used at the onset of the VIII<br />
Corps advance toward Houffalize. On<br />
the morning of the 30th, then, the corps<br />
order of battle (e<strong>as</strong>t to west) would be<br />
the 101st, CCA of the 9th Armored, the<br />
11th Armored Division, and the 87th In-<br />
fantry Division, with these l<strong>as</strong>t two<br />
617<br />
divisions designated to make the main<br />
effort.<br />
The 11th Armored (General Kil-<br />
burn) had been hurried from training<br />
in the United Kingdom to shore up the<br />
Meuse River line if needed and had<br />
some cavalry patrolling on the e<strong>as</strong>t bank<br />
when Eisenhower turned the division<br />
over to Bradley. Late on the evening<br />
of the 28th General Kilburn received<br />
orders from Middleton to move his di-<br />
vision to the Neufchâteau area, and two<br />
hours after midnight the 11th Armored<br />
began a forced march, the distance<br />
about eighty-five miles. The heavy col-<br />
umns were slowed by snow, ice, and the<br />
limited-capacity bridge used to cross the<br />
Meuse, but CCA, in the van, reached<br />
the new <strong>as</strong>sembly area a couple of hours<br />
before receiving the corps attack or-<br />
der issued at 1800. CCB and the remain-<br />
der of the division were still on the<br />
road. Some units of this green division<br />
would have to go directly from the<br />
march column into the attack, set for<br />
0730 the next morning. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
time for reconnaissance and the division<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault plan had to be blocked out with<br />
only the h<strong>as</strong>tily issued maps <strong>as</strong> guid-<br />
ance.<br />
The general mission given the 11th<br />
Armored–and the 87th <strong>as</strong> well–w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
swing west around B<strong>as</strong>togne, capture<br />
the heights south of Houffalize, and se-<br />
cure the Ourthe River line. The first<br />
ph<strong>as</strong>e, however, w<strong>as</strong> a power play to<br />
drive the enemy back to the north in an<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault, set in motion from the Neufchâ-<br />
teau-B<strong>as</strong>togne road, which would sweep<br />
forward on the left of CCA, 9th Ar-<br />
mored. General Kilburn wanted to<br />
attack with combat commands solidly<br />
abre<strong>as</strong>t, but the VIII Corps commander,<br />
concerned by the thought of exposing
618 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
11TH ARMORED DIVISION HALF-TRACKS MASSED on the outskirts of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
the relatively untested 87th without tank<br />
support, ordered Kilburn to divide his<br />
force so <strong>as</strong> to place one combat com-<br />
mand close to the new infantry division.<br />
Thus the 11th Armored would make its<br />
initial drive with CCB (Col. Wesley W.<br />
Yale) p<strong>as</strong>sing e<strong>as</strong>t of a large woods-the<br />
Bois des Haies de Magery–and CCA<br />
(Brig. Gen. Willard A. Holbrook, Jr.)<br />
circling west of the same. The 87th In-<br />
fantry Division (Brig. Gen. Frank L.<br />
Culin, Jr.) had arrived on the Continent<br />
in early December and been briefly em-<br />
ployed <strong>as</strong> part of the Third <strong>Army</strong> in the<br />
Saar offensive. Ordered into the SHAEF<br />
reserve at Reims on 24 December, the<br />
division w<strong>as</strong> at full combat strength<br />
when, five days later, the order came to<br />
entruck for the 100-mile move to the<br />
VIII Corps. T<strong>here</strong> the 87th <strong>as</strong>sembled<br />
between Bertrix and Libramont in prep-<br />
aration for an advance on the follow-<br />
ing morning to carry the corps left<br />
wing north, cut the B<strong>as</strong>togne–St. Hu-<br />
bert road, and seize the high ground<br />
beyond. Middleton’s two-division attack<br />
would be well stiffened by ten battalions<br />
of corps artillery.<br />
Across the lines, on the afternoon of<br />
29 December, General Manteuffel called<br />
his commanders together. Here were<br />
the generals who had carried the B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne fight thus far and generals of the<br />
divisions moving into the area, now in-<br />
cluding three SS commanders. Manteuf-<br />
fel, it is related, began the conference
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 619<br />
with some critical remarks about the<br />
original failure to apprehend the impor-<br />
tance of B<strong>as</strong>togne. He then proceeded<br />
to tell the <strong>as</strong>semblage that the Ardennes<br />
offensive, <strong>as</strong> planned, w<strong>as</strong> at an end,<br />
that B<strong>as</strong>togne had become the “central<br />
problem,” and that the German High<br />
Command viewed the forthcoming<br />
battle <strong>as</strong> an “opportunity,” an opportun-<br />
ity to win a striking victory or at the le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
to chew up the enemy divisions which<br />
would be poured into the fight. The<br />
operation would be in three ph<strong>as</strong>es:<br />
first, close the ring once again around<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne; second, push the Americans<br />
back to the south; third, with reinforce-<br />
ments now on the way, take B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
in a final <strong>as</strong>sault.<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group Luettwitz would con-<br />
duct the fight to restore the German<br />
circle with the XXXIX and XLVII<br />
Panzer Corps, the first attacking e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
to west, the second striking west to e<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
A number of the divisions en route to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne had not yet arrived and the<br />
attack set for the 30th would be neither<br />
<strong>as</strong> strong nor <strong>as</strong> co-ordinated <strong>as</strong><br />
Manteuffel would wish-but he w<strong>as</strong><br />
under pressure from his superiors and<br />
could entertain no further delay. The<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern <strong>as</strong>sault force comprised the much<br />
understrength and crippled 1st SS Pan-<br />
zer and the 167th Volks Grenadier<br />
Divisions; its drive w<strong>as</strong> to be made<br />
via Lutrebois toward Assenois. The at-<br />
tack from the west would be spearhead-<br />
ed by the Fuehrer Begleit advancing<br />
over Sibret and hammering the ring<br />
closed. The 3d Panzer Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion w<strong>as</strong> to advance in echelon to the<br />
left of Remer’s brigade while the rem-<br />
nants of the 26th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion and 15th Panzer Grenadier Division<br />
screened to the west and north of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. The timing for the arrival of<br />
the incoming reinforcements–the 12th<br />
SS Panzer, the 9th SS Panzer, and the<br />
340th Volks Grenadier Divisions–w<strong>as</strong><br />
problematical .<br />
The Contact<br />
Generalmajor Walter Denkert, com-<br />
manding the 3d Panzer Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion, planned to attack at 0730 on 30<br />
December because of the predisposition<br />
the Germans had noted (and on which<br />
they had capitalized many times) for the<br />
Americans to delay the start of the day’s<br />
operations until about eight or nine<br />
o’clock in the morning. His division ex-<br />
pected to move south through the Bois<br />
de Fragotte (between Chenogne and<br />
Senonchamps) , then swing southe<strong>as</strong>t to<br />
retake Villeroux. The attack plan w<strong>as</strong><br />
intended to pave the way for Remer’s<br />
brigade (attached to the 3d Panzer<br />
Grenadier Division since Denkert w<strong>as</strong><br />
the senior commander) to seize Sibret<br />
and permit the combined force to de-<br />
bouch against Assenois and Hompré.<br />
The Americans, <strong>as</strong> it turned out, were<br />
not <strong>as</strong> dilatory <strong>as</strong> had been anticipated-<br />
both their attack divisions were moving<br />
north by 0730. Remer also kept to his<br />
time schedule.<br />
The Fuehrer Begleit advance w<strong>as</strong><br />
geared for a one-two punch at Sibret.<br />
The battalion of Remer’s panzer gren-<br />
adiers, which had cl<strong>as</strong>hed briefly with<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Collins in Chenogne the<br />
previous evening, moved out over the<br />
snow-covered fields to pry an opening<br />
on the north edge of Sibret, while the<br />
Fuehrer Begleit tank group–carrying<br />
a battalion of grenadiers–waited in<br />
Chenogne to move forward on a parallel<br />
trail which p<strong>as</strong>sed through Flohimont
620 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
and entered Sibret from the west. A<br />
dense ground fog covered the area for a<br />
few hours, m<strong>as</strong>king the opposing forces<br />
from one another. The grenadier bat-<br />
talion made some progress and drove<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Collins back toward Sibret,<br />
but the battalion commander w<strong>as</strong> killed<br />
and the advance slowed down. Remer’s<br />
tank group w<strong>as</strong> nearing Flohimont when<br />
the fog curtain raised abruptly to reveal<br />
about thirty American tanks.<br />
Colonel Yale had divided CCB of the<br />
11th Armored into a tank force (T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Poker) and an infantry t<strong>as</strong>k force<br />
(T<strong>as</strong>k Force Pat). T<strong>as</strong>k Force Pat, es-<br />
sentially the 21st Armored Infantry Bat-<br />
talion, had marked Flohimont on the<br />
map <strong>as</strong> its line of departure but in the<br />
approach march became confused. Com-<br />
munications failed, and the reconnais-<br />
sance troops in the van of CCB got lost<br />
and fell back on T<strong>as</strong>k Force Pat. Adding<br />
menace to confusion the German artil-<br />
lery began to pound the Jodenville-<br />
Flohimont road along which the attack<br />
w<strong>as</strong> directed. Meanwhile the reinforced<br />
41st Tank Battalion (T<strong>as</strong>k Force Pok-<br />
er), which had picked Lav<strong>as</strong>elle from<br />
the map <strong>as</strong> its goal, rolled north with<br />
little opposition and reached its objec-<br />
tive about a mile and a half west of<br />
Chenogne. These were the American<br />
tanks seen by Remer.<br />
Lav<strong>as</strong>elle turned out to be located in a<br />
hollow, hardly a place for armor, and<br />
the t<strong>as</strong>k force commander (Maj. Wray<br />
F. Sag<strong>as</strong>er) decided to move on to the<br />
villages of Brul and Houmont which<br />
occupied some high ground just to the<br />
north. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a creek to cross with<br />
a single rickety bridge, but the tanks<br />
made it. The twin hamlets were de-<br />
fended only by a few infantry and fell<br />
e<strong>as</strong>ily-then intense rocket and mortar<br />
fire set in. T<strong>as</strong>k Force Poker w<strong>as</strong> on its<br />
own, well in front of the rest of the 11th<br />
Armored, uncertain that its sister t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
force would succeed in forging abre<strong>as</strong>t<br />
at Chenogne, and with night coming on.<br />
Remer apparently decided to forgo a<br />
test of strength with the American armor<br />
moving p<strong>as</strong>t in the west, his mission<br />
being to attack e<strong>as</strong>tward, but when word<br />
reached him that the Americans had hit<br />
the outpost at Lav<strong>as</strong>elle he hurried in<br />
person to check the security screen cover-<br />
ing the western flank. Here one of<br />
Remer’s panzer grenadier battalions had<br />
thrown forward an outpost line extend-<br />
ing <strong>as</strong> far west <strong>as</strong> Gerimont and backed<br />
by a concentration of flak, <strong>as</strong>sault guns,<br />
and mortars in the Bois des Valets to the<br />
north of and about equidistant from<br />
Houmont and Chenogne. Satisfied that<br />
this groupment could hold the enemy,<br />
Remer returned to Chenogne. He found<br />
that the village had been bombarded by<br />
planes and guns till it w<strong>as</strong> only a heap of<br />
stones with a handful of grenadiers<br />
garrisoning the rubble. Remer instantly<br />
sent a radio SOS to the commander of<br />
the 3d Panzer Grenadier, then set out to<br />
find his tank group.<br />
When the bombardment started at<br />
Chenogne, the German tanks still t<strong>here</strong><br />
simply had pulled out of the village.<br />
About the same time, T<strong>as</strong>k Force Pat<br />
resumed its march on Chenogne, Com-<br />
pany B of the 22d Tank Battalion lead-<br />
ing and the armored infantry following<br />
in their half-tracks. Near the village, in<br />
a lowering fog, the German armor sur-<br />
prised the company of Shermans and shot<br />
out seven of them. The enemy allowed<br />
the American aid men to carry away the<br />
surviving tankers and both sides fell<br />
back. As dusk came Remer set about<br />
pulling his command together, and the
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE<br />
3d Panzer Grenadier-heeding his call<br />
for <strong>as</strong>sistance-moved troops into the<br />
ruins of Chenogne. 12 This division had<br />
taken little part in the day’s activity,<br />
probably because of the intense shelling<br />
directed on its <strong>as</strong>sembly area in the Bois<br />
de Fragotte by the 4th Armored and<br />
corps artillery, the cross fire laid down<br />
from Villeroux by the tanks of T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Karsteter, and the uncertainty of<br />
Remer’s situation.<br />
The western advance on 30 December<br />
by CCA of the 11th Armored met almost<br />
no resistance during the first few hours,<br />
in part because the 28th Cavalry<br />
Squadron had driven the German out-<br />
post line back on Remagne. The imme-<br />
diate objective, Remagne, w<strong>as</strong> the an-<br />
chor position for the left wing of the<br />
new and attenuated Panzer Lehr posi-<br />
tion, but this division had just completed<br />
its shift e<strong>as</strong>tward and had only small<br />
foreposts <strong>here</strong>. One of these, in the ham-<br />
let of Rondu about a mile and a half<br />
south of Remagne, seems to have fl<strong>as</strong>hed<br />
back warning of the American approach.<br />
In any c<strong>as</strong>e the 63d Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion, leading the march <strong>as</strong> T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force White, had just come onto the<br />
crest of the ridge beyond Rondu when,<br />
<strong>as</strong> the men on the receiving end vividly<br />
recall, “All hell broke loose.” The two<br />
tanks at the point of the column were<br />
hit in one, two order. The armored in-<br />
fantry took a hundred c<strong>as</strong>ualties in<br />
thirty minutes while digging madly in<br />
the frozen ground. T<strong>as</strong>k Force Blue (the<br />
42d Tank Battalion) w<strong>as</strong> shielded by<br />
the ridge and received little fire. Since<br />
the 87th Division had not yet come up<br />
12 Remer’s operations west of B<strong>as</strong>togne are de-<br />
scribed by Remer and some of his officers in MS<br />
# B–592 (Remer) and Die Geschichte Des<br />
Panrerkorps Grossdeutschland, vol. II.<br />
621<br />
on the left, the 41st Cavalry Reconnais-<br />
sance Squadron moved around to the<br />
west flank in anticipation of a German<br />
counterthrust.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> midafternoon. German high<br />
velocity guns were sweeping the ridge,<br />
and t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no room for maneuver:<br />
the Ourthe lay to the west and the Bois<br />
des Haies de Magery spread to the e<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
separating CCA and CCB. General Kil-<br />
burn <strong>as</strong>ked the corps commander to <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sign Remagne to the 87th and let CCA<br />
sideslip to rejoin CCB e<strong>as</strong>t of the woods.<br />
Middleton agreed and a new maneuver<br />
w<strong>as</strong> evolved for 31 December in which<br />
all three combat commands of the 11th<br />
Armored would attack to concentrate at<br />
the head of the Rechrival valley, thus<br />
following up the drive made by T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Poker. An hour before midnight<br />
CCA began its withdrawal.<br />
On the left wing of the VIII Corps<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sault units of the 87th Division<br />
were trucked northward on the morning<br />
of 30 December to the line of departure,<br />
in the neighborhood of Br<strong>as</strong>, held by the<br />
109th Infantry. 13 Since the first major<br />
objective w<strong>as</strong> to sever the German supply<br />
route along the St. Hubert–B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
road the attack w<strong>as</strong> weighted on the<br />
right, with the 345th Infantry (Col.<br />
13 Since-the 87th Division and the 11th Armored<br />
fought side by side during this operation, their<br />
journals and histories should be used together.<br />
The 87th Division AAR is of little value but<br />
those prepared by the regiments are quite de-<br />
tailed. See Also A Historical and Pictorial Record<br />
of the 87th Infantry Division in World War II<br />
(Baton Rouge: <strong>Army</strong> and Navy Publishing Com-<br />
pany, 1946). The records of the 11th Armored<br />
are surprisingly complete for an armored outfit<br />
in its first operations. See also Hal D. Steward,<br />
Thunderbolt (W<strong>as</strong>hington: 11th Armored Division<br />
Association, 1948). . The combat interviews are<br />
very comprehensive in coverage of the 11th<br />
Armored but have virtually nothing on the 87th<br />
Division.
622<br />
Dougl<strong>as</strong> Sugg) aiming for a sharp jog<br />
in the road w<strong>here</strong> stood the village of<br />
Pironpré. On the left the 346th Infantry<br />
(Col. Richard B. Wheeler) had a more<br />
restricted t<strong>as</strong>k, that is, to block the roads<br />
coming into St. Hubert from the south.<br />
Earlier the Panzer Lehr had outposted<br />
Highway N26, the 345th route of ad-<br />
vance, but apparently these roadblock<br />
detachments had been called in and<br />
Sugg’s combat team marched the first<br />
five miles without meeting the enemy.<br />
The advance guard, formed by the 1st<br />
Battalion (Lt. Col. Frank L. Bock),<br />
w<strong>as</strong> within sight of the crossroads village<br />
of Moircy and less than two miles from<br />
the objective when a pair of enemy burp<br />
guns began to chatter. This w<strong>as</strong> only<br />
outpost fire, and the leading rifle com-<br />
pany moved on until, some five hundred<br />
yards short of Moircy, the enemy fire<br />
suddenly thickened across the open,<br />
snow-covered fields, causing many c<strong>as</strong>ual-<br />
ties and halting the Americans. The<br />
accompanying cannoneers (the 334th<br />
Field Artillery) went into action, the<br />
mortar crews started to work, and both<br />
Companies A and B deployed for the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault. Short rushes brought the rifle<br />
line forward, though very slowly. By<br />
1400 the Americans were on the edge of<br />
Moircy, but the two companies had lost<br />
most of their officers and their ranks were<br />
riddled.<br />
Colonel Bock ordered his reserve com-<br />
pany to circle west of the village and<br />
take the next hamlet, Jenneville. While<br />
moving over a little rise outside Jenne-<br />
ville, the leading platoon met a fusillade<br />
of bullets that claimed twenty c<strong>as</strong>ualties<br />
in two minutes. Nevertheless the 2d Pla-<br />
toon of Company C reached the edge of<br />
the village. At this moment two enemy<br />
tanks appeared, stopped <strong>as</strong> if to survey<br />
THE ARDENNES,: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the scene, then began to work their<br />
machine guns. The artillery forward ob-<br />
server crawled toward the panzers to<br />
take a look, and w<strong>as</strong> shot. The Company<br />
C commander then called for the artil-<br />
lery, bringing the exploding shells with-<br />
in fifty yards of his own men. The<br />
German tanks still refused to budge.<br />
Two men crept forward with bazook<strong>as</strong>,<br />
only to be killed by the tank machine<br />
guns, but this episode apparently shook<br />
the tank crews, who now pulled out of<br />
range. Meanwhile Moircy had been<br />
taken and the battalion commander told<br />
Company C to fall back.<br />
The expected German counterattack<br />
at Moircy came about three hours before<br />
midnight. Tanks pacing the <strong>as</strong>sault set<br />
fire to the houses with tracer bullets, and<br />
the two battalion antitank guns were<br />
abandoned. Although Colonel Sugg<br />
ordered the battalion out, the company<br />
radios failed and in the confusion only<br />
Companies A and B left the village.<br />
Some of the machine gunners, a platoon<br />
of Company B, and most of Company<br />
C stayed on, taking to the cellars when<br />
the American artillery–including a bat-<br />
tery of 240-mm. howitzers–started to<br />
shell Moircy. By midnight the Germans<br />
had had enough and evacuated the vil-<br />
lage. Bock then ordered the remaining<br />
defenders out. This day of sharp fighting<br />
cost the 1st Battalion seven officers and<br />
125 men. Most of the wounded were<br />
evacuated, however; during the night<br />
battle in Moircy one aid man had twice<br />
moved the twelve wounded in his charge<br />
from burning buildings.<br />
The much touted Fuehrer Begleit<br />
attack failed on the 30th to dent the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne corridor-indeed it can be said<br />
that it never started. What of the e<strong>as</strong>tern
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 623<br />
jaw of the h<strong>as</strong>tily constructed German<br />
vise–the 1st SS Panzer attack?<br />
The 1st SS Panzer w<strong>as</strong> still licking its<br />
wounds after the dis<strong>as</strong>trous fight <strong>as</strong><br />
advance guard of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>,<br />
when Model ordered the division to<br />
move south, beginning 26 December.<br />
Most of its tanks were in the repair shops,<br />
fuel w<strong>as</strong> short, and some units did not<br />
leave for B<strong>as</strong>togne until the afternoon<br />
of the 29th. This march w<strong>as</strong> across the<br />
grain of the German communications<br />
net and became badly snarled in the<br />
streets of Houffalize, w<strong>here</strong> Allied air<br />
attacks had caused a major traffic jam,<br />
that forced tank units to move only in<br />
small groups. It is probable that fewer<br />
than fifty tanks reached the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
area in time to take part in the 30 De-<br />
cember attack.<br />
The appearance of this SS unit w<strong>as</strong><br />
greeted by something less than popular<br />
acclaim. The regular <strong>Army</strong> troops dis-<br />
liked the publicity Goebbels had<br />
lavished on the feats of the SS divisions,<br />
and the old line commanders considered<br />
them insubordinate. Worse still, the 1st<br />
SS Panzer Division came into the sector<br />
next to the 14th Parachute Regiment:<br />
the SS regarded themselves-or at le<strong>as</strong>t<br />
were regarded-<strong>as</strong> Himmler’s troops,<br />
w<strong>here</strong><strong>as</strong> the parachute divisions were the<br />
personal creation of Goering. (It is not<br />
surprising that after the attack on the<br />
30th the 1st SS Panzer tried to bring the<br />
officers of the 14th before a Nazi field<br />
court.) 14<br />
The 167th Yolks Grenadier Division<br />
(Generalleutnant Hans-Kurt Hoecker) ,<br />
ordered to join the 1st SS Panzer<br />
in the attack, w<strong>as</strong> looked upon by<br />
Manteuffel and others with more favor.<br />
14 See MSS # A–932 (Gersdorff); B–041<br />
(Hoecker) ; and B–799 (Reschke) .<br />
This w<strong>as</strong> a veteran division which had<br />
distinguished itself on the Soviet front,<br />
The 167th had been refitting and train-<br />
ing replacements from the 17th Luft-<br />
waffe Feld Division when orders reached<br />
its Hungarian c<strong>as</strong>ernes to entrain for the<br />
west. On 24 December the division ar-<br />
rived at Gerolstein on the Rhine; though<br />
some units had to detrain e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
river, Hoecker’s command w<strong>as</strong> at full<br />
strength when it began the march to<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. A third of the division were<br />
veterans of the Russian battles, and in<br />
addition t<strong>here</strong> were two hundred picked<br />
men who had been officer candidates<br />
before the December comb-out. Hoecker<br />
had no mechanized heavy weapons, how-<br />
ever, and the division transport consisted<br />
of worn-out Italian trucks for which<br />
t<strong>here</strong> were no spare parts.<br />
The 167th and the kampfgruppe from<br />
the 1st SS Panzer (be it remembered the<br />
entire division w<strong>as</strong> not present on the<br />
30th) were supposed to be reinforced by<br />
the 14th Parachute Regiment and the<br />
901st of the Panzer Lehr. Both of these<br />
regiments were already in the line south-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne, but were fought-out<br />
and woefully understrength. The first<br />
plan of attack had been b<strong>as</strong>ed on a con-<br />
certed effort to drive straight through the<br />
American lines and cut the corridor be-<br />
tween Assenois and Hompré. Just before<br />
the attack this plan w<strong>as</strong> modified to make<br />
the Martelange-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway the<br />
initial objective. The line of contact on<br />
the 30th extended from Neffe south into<br />
the woods e<strong>as</strong>t of Marvie, then followed<br />
the forest line and the Lutrebois-Lutre-<br />
mange road south to Villers-la-Bonne-<br />
Eau. The boundary between the 167th<br />
and the 1st SS Panzer ran through Lutre-<br />
bois. The 167th, lined up in the north<br />
along the Br<strong>as</strong>-B<strong>as</strong>togne road, would
624 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
aim its <strong>as</strong>sault at the Remonfosse sector<br />
of the highway. The 1st SS Panzer, sup-<br />
ported on the left by the 14th Parachute<br />
Regiment, intended to sally out of Lu-<br />
trebois and Villers-la-Bonne-Eau. Lutre-<br />
bois, however, w<strong>as</strong> captured late in the<br />
evening of the 29th by the 3d Battalion<br />
of the 134th Infantry. A map picked<br />
up t<strong>here</strong> by the Americans showed the<br />
boundaries and dispositions of the Ger-<br />
man <strong>as</strong>sault forces, but either the map<br />
legend w<strong>as</strong> unspecific or the word failed<br />
to get back to higher authority for the<br />
German blow on the morning of 30 De-<br />
cember did achieve a marked me<strong>as</strong>ure of<br />
tactical surprise.<br />
The 35th Infantry Division stood<br />
directly in the path of the German at-<br />
tack, having gradually turned from a<br />
column of regiments to face northe<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
The northernmost regiment, the 134th<br />
Infantry, had come in from reserve to<br />
capture Lutrebois at the request of CCA,<br />
4th Armored, but it had only two bat-<br />
talions in the line. The 137th Infantry<br />
w<strong>as</strong> deployed near Villers-la-Bonne-Eau,<br />
and on the night of the 29th Companies<br />
K and L forced their way into the village,<br />
radioing back that they needed bazooka<br />
ammunition. (It seems likely that the<br />
Americans shared Villers with a com-<br />
pany of German Pioneers.) In the south<br />
the 320th Infantry had become involved<br />
in a bitter fight around a farmstead out-<br />
35TH INFANTRY DIVISION MACHINE GUN POSITION south of B<strong>as</strong>togne.
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE<br />
side of Harlange–the German attack<br />
would p<strong>as</strong>s obliquely across its front but<br />
without impact.<br />
During the night of 29 December the<br />
tank column of the 1st SS Panzer moved<br />
up along the road linking Tarchamps<br />
and Lutremange. The usable road net<br />
w<strong>as</strong> very sparse in this sector. Once<br />
through Lutremange, however, the Ger-<br />
man column could deploy in two ar-<br />
mored <strong>as</strong>sault forces, one moving<br />
through Villers-la-Bonne-Eau, the other<br />
angling northwest through Lutrebois.<br />
Before dawn the leading tank companies<br />
rumbled toward these two villages. At<br />
Villers-la-Bonne-Eau Companies K and<br />
L, 137th Infantry, came under attack by<br />
seven tanks heavily supported by in-<br />
fantry. The panzers moved in close,<br />
bl<strong>as</strong>ting the stone houses and setting the<br />
village ablaze. At 0845 a radio message<br />
reached the command post of the 137th<br />
<strong>as</strong>king for the artillery to lay down a<br />
barrage of smoke and high explosive,<br />
but before the gunners could get a<br />
sensing the radio went dead. Only one<br />
of the 169 men inside the village got<br />
out, Sgt. Webster Phillips, who earlier<br />
had run through the rifle fire to warn<br />
the reserve company of the battalion west<br />
of Villers.<br />
The battle in and around Lutrebois<br />
w<strong>as</strong> then and remains to this day<br />
jumbled and confused. T<strong>here</strong> is no co-<br />
<strong>here</strong>nt account from the German side,<br />
and it is quite possible that the forma-<br />
tions involved in the fight did not, for<br />
the re<strong>as</strong>ons discussed earlier, co-operate<br />
<strong>as</strong> planned. The American troops who<br />
were drawn into the action found them-<br />
selves in a melee which defied exact de-<br />
scription and in which platoons and<br />
companies engaged enemy units without<br />
being aware that other American soldiers<br />
625<br />
and weapons had taken the same<br />
German unit under fire. It is not sur-<br />
prising, then, that two or three units<br />
would claim to have destroyed what on<br />
later examination proves to have been<br />
the same enemy tank detachment and<br />
that a cumulative listing of these claims<br />
–some fifty-odd German tanks destroyed<br />
–probably gives more panzers put out of<br />
action than the 1st SS Panzer brought<br />
into the field.<br />
It is unfortunate that the historical<br />
reproduction of the Lutrebois fight in<br />
the von Rankian sense (“exactly <strong>as</strong><br />
it w<strong>as</strong>”) is impossible, for the American<br />
use of the combined arms in this action<br />
w<strong>as</strong> so outstanding <strong>as</strong> to merit careful<br />
analysis by the professional soldier and<br />
student. The 4th Armored Division ar-<br />
tillery, for example, simultaneously en-<br />
gaged the 1st SS Panzer in the e<strong>as</strong>t and<br />
the 3d Panzer Grenadier in the west.<br />
Weyland’s fighter-bombers from the<br />
XIX Tactical Air Command intervened<br />
at precisely the right time to blunt the<br />
main German armored thrust and set up<br />
better targets for engagement by the<br />
ground forces. American tanks and tank<br />
destroyers co-operated to whipsaw the<br />
enemy <strong>as</strong>sault units. The infantry action,<br />
<strong>as</strong> will be seen, had a decisive effect at<br />
numerous points in the battle. Two cir-<br />
cumstances in particular would color the<br />
events of 30 December: because of<br />
CCA’s earlier interest in Lutrebois, radio<br />
and wire communications between the<br />
4th Armored and the 35th Division were<br />
unusually good in this sector; although<br />
the 35th had started the drive north with-<br />
out the normal attachment of a separate<br />
tank battalion, the close proximity of the<br />
veteran 4th Armored more than com-<br />
pensated for this lack of an organic<br />
tank-killing capability.
626 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Lutrebois, two and a half miles e<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of the German objective at Assenois, had<br />
most of its houses built along a 1,000-<br />
yard stretch of road which runs more<br />
or less e<strong>as</strong>t and west across an open plain<br />
and is bordered at either end by an ex-<br />
tensive wooded rise. On the morning of<br />
the 30th the 3d Battalion of the 134th<br />
Infantry (Lt. Col. W. C. Wood) w<strong>as</strong><br />
deployed in and around the village:<br />
Company L w<strong>as</strong> inside Lutrebois; Com-<br />
panies I and K had dug in during the<br />
previous evening along the road e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
the village; the battalion heavy machine<br />
guns covered the road west of the vil-<br />
lage. <strong>To</strong> the right, disposed in a thin<br />
line fronting on the valley, w<strong>as</strong> the 2d<br />
Battalion (Maj. C. F. McDannel).<br />
About 0445–the hour is uncertain-<br />
the enemy started his move toward<br />
Lutrebois with tanks and infantry, and<br />
at the same time more infantry crossed<br />
the valley and slipped through the lines<br />
of the 2d Battalion. As the first <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
force crossed the opening e<strong>as</strong>t of Lutre-<br />
bois, the American cannoneers went into<br />
action with such effect <strong>as</strong> to stop this<br />
detachment in its tracks. The next<br />
German sortie came in a hook around<br />
the north side of Lutrebois. Company L<br />
used up all of its bazooka rounds, then<br />
w<strong>as</strong> engulfed. The German grenadiers<br />
moved on along the western road but<br />
were checked t<strong>here</strong> for at le<strong>as</strong>t an hour<br />
by the heavy machine guns. During this<br />
midmorning ph<strong>as</strong>e seven enemy tanks<br />
were spotted north of Lutrebois. A pla-<br />
toon of the 654th Tank Destroyer Bat-<br />
talion accounted for four, two were put<br />
out of action by artillery high explosive,<br />
and one w<strong>as</strong> immobilized by a mine.<br />
News of the attack reached CCA of<br />
the 4th Armored at 0635, and General<br />
Earnest promptly turned his command<br />
to face e<strong>as</strong>t in support of the 35th Divi-<br />
sion. By 1000 General Dager w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
shuffling CCB to take over the CCA<br />
positions. The first reinforcement dis-<br />
patched by CCA w<strong>as</strong> the 51st Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion, which hurried in its<br />
half-tracks to back up the thin line of the<br />
2d Battalion. Here the combination of<br />
fog and woods resulted in a very con-<br />
fused fight, but the 2d Battalion con-<br />
tinued to hold in its position while the<br />
enemy panzer grenadiers, probably from<br />
the 2d Regiment of the 1st SS Panzer,<br />
seeped into the woods to its rear. The<br />
headquarters and heavy weapons crews<br />
of the 3d Battalion had meanwhile<br />
fallen back to the battalion command<br />
post in the Losange château southwest of<br />
Lutrebois. T<strong>here</strong> the 51st Armored In-<br />
fantry Battalion gave a hand, fighting<br />
from half-tracks and spraying the clear-<br />
ing around the château with .50-caliber<br />
slugs. After a little of this treatment the<br />
German infantry gave up and retired<br />
into the woods.<br />
During the morning the advance<br />
guard of the 167th Volks Grenadiers,<br />
attacking in a column of battalions be-<br />
cause of the constricted road net, crossed<br />
the Martelange-B<strong>as</strong>togne road and<br />
reached the edge of the woods southe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Assenois. Here the grenadiers en-<br />
countered the 51st. Each German<br />
attempt to break into the open w<strong>as</strong><br />
stopped with heavy losses. General<br />
Hoecker says the lead battalion w<strong>as</strong> “cut<br />
to pieces” and that the attack by the<br />
167th w<strong>as</strong> brought to nought by the<br />
Jabos and the “tree sm<strong>as</strong>her” shells<br />
cr<strong>as</strong>hing in from the American batteries.<br />
(Hoecker could not know that the 35th<br />
Division artillery w<strong>as</strong> trying out the new<br />
POZIT fuze and that his division w<strong>as</strong><br />
providing the target for one of the most
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 627<br />
lethal of World War II weapons.)<br />
The main body of the 1st SS Panzer<br />
kampfgruppe appeared an hour or so<br />
before noon moving along the Lutre-<br />
mange-Lutrebois road; some twenty-five<br />
tanks were counted in all. It took two<br />
hours to bring the fighter-bombers into<br />
the fray, but they arrived just in time to<br />
cripple or destroy seven tanks and turn<br />
back the bulk of the panzers. Companies<br />
I and K still were in their foxholes along<br />
the road during the air bombing and<br />
would recall that, lacking bazook<strong>as</strong>, the<br />
green soldiers “popped off” at the tanks<br />
with their rifles and that some of the<br />
German tanks turned <strong>as</strong>ide into the<br />
woods. Later the two companies came<br />
back across the valley, on orders, and<br />
jointed the defense line forming near the<br />
château.<br />
Thirteen German tanks, which may<br />
have debouched from the road before<br />
the air attack, reached the woods south-<br />
west of Lutrebois, but a 4th Armored<br />
artillery observer in a cub plane spotted<br />
them and dropped a message to Com-<br />
pany B of the 35th Tank Battalion. Lt.<br />
John A. Kingsley, the company com-<br />
mander, who had six Sherman tanks and<br />
a platoon from the 701st Tank Destroyer<br />
Battalion, formed an ambush near a<br />
slight ridge that provided his own tanks<br />
with hull defilade and waited. The lead-<br />
ing German company (or platoon),<br />
which had six panzers, happened to see<br />
Company A of the 35th <strong>as</strong> the fog briefly<br />
lifted, and turned, with flank exposed, in<br />
that direction. The first shot from<br />
Kingsley’s covert put away the German<br />
commander’s tank and the other tanks<br />
milled about until all had been knocked<br />
out. Six more German tanks came along<br />
and all were destroyed or disabled. In<br />
the meantime the American tank de-<br />
stroyers took on some accompanying <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault guns, shot up three of them, and<br />
dispersed the neighboring grenadiers.<br />
At the close of day the enemy had<br />
taken Lutrebois and Villers-la-Bonne-<br />
Eau plus the bag of three American<br />
rifle companies, but the e<strong>as</strong>tern counter-<br />
attack, like that in the west, had failed.<br />
Any future attempts to break through to<br />
Assenois and Hompré in this sector<br />
would face an alert and co-ordinated<br />
American defense.<br />
The III Corps Joins the Attack<br />
Despite the events of the 30th t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> no thought in the mind of General<br />
Patton that Millikin’s III Corps would<br />
give over its attack toward St. Vith,<br />
scheduled to flesh out the Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
offensive begun by Middleton. General<br />
Millikin would nonetheless have to alter<br />
his plans somewhat. It had been in-<br />
tended that the 6th Armored Division,<br />
coming in from the XII Corps, would<br />
p<strong>as</strong>s through the 4th Armored (which<br />
now had only forty-two operable tanks)<br />
and set off the attack on 31 December<br />
with a drive northe<strong>as</strong>t from the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
perimeter. The 35th Division w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
parallel this drive by advancing in the<br />
center on a northe<strong>as</strong>t axis, while the 26th<br />
Division, on the corps’ right wing, would<br />
turn its attack in a northwesterly direc-<br />
tion. The 4th Armored expected to p<strong>as</strong>s<br />
to Middleton’s corps, but the latter<br />
agreed on the night of the 30th that<br />
Gaffey’s command should continue its<br />
support of the 35th Division. Whether<br />
the 35th could shake itself free and take<br />
the offensive w<strong>as</strong> questionable, but Gen-<br />
eral Baade had orders to try. The 26th<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> now deployed in its en-<br />
tirety on the north side of the Sure
628<br />
River and its center regiment w<strong>as</strong> almost<br />
in sight of the highway linking Wiltz<br />
and B<strong>as</strong>togne (the next ph<strong>as</strong>e line).<br />
Both flanks of the division were uncov-<br />
ered, however, and German tanks were<br />
observed moving into the area on the<br />
30th.<br />
One thing the III Corps commander<br />
sought to impress on his infantry divi-<br />
sions <strong>as</strong> H-hour loomed–they must keep<br />
out of time-consuming and indecisive<br />
village fights. This, after all, w<strong>as</strong> an<br />
order which had echoed up and down<br />
the chain of command on both sides of<br />
the line, but neither German nor Ameri-<br />
can commanders could alter the tactical<br />
necessities imposed by the Ardennes<br />
geography or prevent freezing troops<br />
from gravitating toward the shelter, no<br />
matter how miserable, promised by some<br />
wrecked crossroads hamlet.<br />
Admittedly the battle which had<br />
flared up on the left wing of the III<br />
Corps w<strong>as</strong> serious, but General Millikin<br />
expected (or at le<strong>as</strong>t hoped) that the<br />
6th Armored Division attack would im-<br />
prove the situation. 15 While deployed on<br />
the Ettelbruck front with the XII Corps,<br />
General Grow’s troops had not been<br />
closely engaged, and the division would<br />
enter the B<strong>as</strong>togne fight with only a<br />
single tank less than prescribed by the<br />
T/O&E. Its orders to move west were<br />
given the division at 0230 on the 29th.<br />
Although the distance involved w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
too great, the movement would be com-<br />
plicated by the necessity of using a road<br />
15 The battle fought by the 6th Armored Divi-<br />
sion e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne received very detailed treat-<br />
ment in the combat interviews. The journals of<br />
the division were collected after the war and<br />
published under the title, Combat Record of the<br />
Sixth Armored Division (Aschaffenburg, n.d.) .<br />
General Grow h<strong>as</strong> provided excerpts from his<br />
personal diary for the author’s use.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
net already saturated in the support of<br />
two corps. The push planned for 31<br />
December turned on the employment of<br />
two combat commands abre<strong>as</strong>t and for<br />
this re<strong>as</strong>on the march north to B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
w<strong>as</strong> organized so that CCA, ordered to<br />
attack on the right, would use the Arlon-<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne highway while CCB, ticketed<br />
for the left wing, would p<strong>as</strong>s through<br />
the VIII Corps zone by way of the Neuf-<br />
château-B<strong>as</strong>togne road.<br />
During the night of 30 December<br />
CCA (Col. John L. Hines, Jr.) rolled<br />
along the icy highway, w<strong>here</strong> the 4th<br />
Armored had accorded running rights to<br />
the newcomers, and through the city;<br />
the advance guard, however, took the<br />
secondary road through Assenois be-<br />
cause of the German threat to the main<br />
route. By daylight CCA w<strong>as</strong> in forward<br />
<strong>as</strong>sembly positions behind the 101st<br />
Airborne line southe<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
CCB failed to make its appearance <strong>as</strong><br />
scheduled. What had happened w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
fouling of the military machine which is<br />
common in all large-scale operations and<br />
which may leave bitterness and recrim-<br />
ination long after the event. The 6th<br />
Armored commander believed he had<br />
cleared CCB’s use of the Neufchâteau<br />
road with both the VIII Corps and the<br />
11th Armored, but when Col. George<br />
Read moved out with his column he<br />
found the highway not only treacher-<br />
ously iced but encumbered with 11th<br />
Armored tanks and vehicles. What Read<br />
had encountered w<strong>as</strong> the switch bringing<br />
the 11th Armored force from the west<br />
around to the right wing. The 11th Ar-<br />
mored had not expected the 6th<br />
Armored column to appear before mid-<br />
night of the 31st. An attempt to run the<br />
two columns abre<strong>as</strong>t failed because the<br />
tanks were slipping all over the road.
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE<br />
CCB later reported that the 11th Ar-<br />
mored blocked the highway for six<br />
hours, that is, until ten o’clock on the<br />
morning of the 31st. Finally General<br />
Grow ordered Read’s force to branch off<br />
and go into <strong>as</strong>sembly at Clochimont on<br />
the Assenois road.<br />
Colonel Hines intended to postpone<br />
the CCA attack until the running mate<br />
arrived. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no cover w<strong>here</strong> his<br />
troops were waiting, however, and <strong>as</strong> the<br />
morning wore on intense enemy fire be-<br />
gan to take serious toll. He and Grow<br />
decided, t<strong>here</strong>fore, to launch a limited<br />
objective attack in which the two CCA<br />
t<strong>as</strong>k forces would start from near the<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne-Br<strong>as</strong> road and thrust northe<strong>as</strong>t.<br />
The armored t<strong>as</strong>k force, organized<br />
around the 69th Tank Battalion (Lt.<br />
Col. Chester E. Kennedy), had the t<strong>as</strong>k<br />
of capturing Neffe and clearing the en-<br />
emy from the woods to the e<strong>as</strong>t; the<br />
infantry t<strong>as</strong>k force, b<strong>as</strong>ically the 44th<br />
Armored Infantry Battalion (Lt. Col.<br />
Charles E. Brown), w<strong>as</strong> to move abre<strong>as</strong>t<br />
of Kennedy, scour the woods south of<br />
Neffe, and seize the nose of high ground<br />
which overlooked Wardin on the north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t. The <strong>as</strong>sault, begun shortly after<br />
noon, rolled through Neffe with little<br />
opposition. But snow squalls clouded the<br />
landscape, the fighter-bombers sent to<br />
bl<strong>as</strong>t targets in front of CCA could not<br />
get through the overc<strong>as</strong>t, and the ar-<br />
mored infantry made little progress.<br />
CCA’s expectation that the 35th Division<br />
would come abre<strong>as</strong>t on the right w<strong>as</strong><br />
d<strong>as</strong>hed, for the 35th had its hands full.<br />
Just before dusk small enemy forces<br />
struck at Hines’s exposed flanks, and<br />
CCA halted, leaving the artillery to<br />
maintain a protective barrage through<br />
the night.<br />
The role of the artillery would be of<br />
629<br />
prime importance in all the fighting<br />
done by the 6th Armored in what now<br />
had come to be called “the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
pocket.” Not only the three organic bat-<br />
talions of the division, but an additional<br />
four battalions belonging to the 193d<br />
Field Artillery Group were moved into<br />
the pocket on the 31st, and the firing<br />
batteries were employed almost on the<br />
perimeter itself. A feature of the battle<br />
would be a counterbattery duel–quite<br />
uncommon at this stage of the Ardennes<br />
Campaign–for the I SS Panzer Corps<br />
had introduced an artillery corps, in-<br />
cluding some long-range 170-mm. batter-<br />
ies, and a Werfer brigade southe<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne. Now and later the American<br />
gunners would find it necessary to move<br />
quickly from one alternate position to<br />
another, none too e<strong>as</strong>y a t<strong>as</strong>k, for the gun<br />
carriages froze f<strong>as</strong>t and even to turn a<br />
piece required blow torches and pinch<br />
bars.<br />
On the morning of New Year’s Day<br />
CCB finally w<strong>as</strong> in place on the left of<br />
Hines’s combat command. The imme-<br />
diate t<strong>as</strong>k in hand w<strong>as</strong> to knife through<br />
the German supply routes, feeding into<br />
and across the Longvilly road, which<br />
permitted north-south movement along<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>tern face of the B<strong>as</strong>togne pocket<br />
and were being used to build up the<br />
forces in the Lutrebois sector. CCA<br />
would attempt a further advance to clear<br />
the woods and ridges beyond Neffe.<br />
CCB, working in two t<strong>as</strong>k forces, aimed<br />
its attack on Bourcy and Arloncourt with<br />
an eye to the high ground dominating<br />
the German road net. The 6th Armored<br />
Division expected that troops of the<br />
101st Airborne would extend the push<br />
on the left of CCB and drive the enemy<br />
out of the Bois Jacques north of Bizory,<br />
the latter the first objective for CCB’s
630 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tank force. The previous afternoon the<br />
VIII Corps commander had ordered<br />
General Taylor to use the reserve battal-<br />
ion of the 506th Parachute Infantry for<br />
this purpose, then had countermanded<br />
his order. Apparently General Grow and<br />
his division knew nothing of the change.<br />
Communication between divisions sub-<br />
ordinate to two different corps always is<br />
difficult, but in this c<strong>as</strong>e, with an ar-<br />
mored and an airborne division<br />
involved, the situation w<strong>as</strong> even worse.<br />
At this time the only radio contact be-<br />
tween Taylor and Grow w<strong>as</strong> by relay<br />
through an army supply point several<br />
miles south of B<strong>as</strong>togne, but the two<br />
generals did meet on 31 December and<br />
the day following.<br />
The morning of the attack, 1 January<br />
1945, w<strong>as</strong> dark with cloud banks and<br />
squalls <strong>as</strong> the 68th Tank Battalion (Lt.<br />
Col. Harold C. Davall) moved rapidly<br />
along the narrow road to Bizory. The<br />
78th Grenadier Regiment, in this sector<br />
since the first days of the B<strong>as</strong>togne siege,<br />
had erected its main line of resistance<br />
farther to the e<strong>as</strong>t and Bizory fell e<strong>as</strong>ily.<br />
At the same time Davall’s force seized<br />
Hill 510, which earlier had caused the<br />
101st Airborne so much trouble. About<br />
noon the Americans began to receive<br />
heavy fire, including high velocity shells,<br />
from around Mageret on their right<br />
flank. Although doing so involved a<br />
detour, the 68th wheeled to deal with<br />
Mageret, its tanks cr<strong>as</strong>hing into the vil-<br />
lage while the <strong>as</strong>sault gun platoon en-<br />
gaged the enemy antitank guns firing<br />
from wood cover nearby. The grenadiers<br />
fought for Mageret and it w<strong>as</strong> midafter-<br />
noon before resistance collapsed. Then<br />
the 69th Tank Battalion from CCA,<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> on call, took over the fight to<br />
drive e<strong>as</strong>t from Mageret while its sister<br />
battalion turned back for the planned<br />
thrust at Arloncourt.<br />
By this time the sun had come out,<br />
visibility w<strong>as</strong> good, and the CCB tanks<br />
were making such rapid progress that<br />
the division artillery commander (Col.<br />
Lowell M. Riley) brought his three bat-<br />
talions right up on Davall’s heels. With-<br />
in an hour the 68th w<strong>as</strong> fighting at<br />
Arloncourt, but <strong>here</strong> it had hit the main<br />
German position. Briefly the Americans<br />
held a piece of Arloncourt, withdrawing<br />
at dark when it became apparent that<br />
the 50th Armored Infantry Battalion<br />
(Lt. Col. Arnold R. Wall), fighting<br />
through the woods to the northwest,<br />
could not come abre<strong>as</strong>t. As it turned out,<br />
the 50th w<strong>as</strong> forced to fall back to the<br />
morning line of departure. It too had<br />
collided with the main enemy defenses<br />
and w<strong>as</strong> hit by a German counterattack–<br />
abruptly checked when the 212th Field<br />
Artillery laid in 500 rounds in twenty<br />
minutes. 16<br />
The brunt of the battle in the CCA<br />
zone w<strong>as</strong> borne by the 44th Armored In-<br />
fantry, continuing doggedly through the<br />
woods southe<strong>as</strong>t of Neffe against deter-<br />
mined and well entrenched German in-<br />
fantry. Whenever the <strong>as</strong>sault came<br />
within fifty yards of the foxhole line, the<br />
grenadiers climbed out with rifle and<br />
machine gun to counterattack. Two or<br />
three times Brown’s battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
ejected from the woods, but at close of<br />
day the Americans were deployed per-<br />
haps halfway inside the forest. The 6th<br />
Armored had gotten no <strong>as</strong>sistance from<br />
the 35th Division during the day, and it<br />
16 During the battle in the woods Sgt. George P.<br />
Rimmer of Company A led a series of combat<br />
patrols against the enemy with such daring and<br />
success <strong>as</strong> to merit the special commendation of<br />
his commander. He received the DSC.
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 631<br />
w<strong>as</strong> apparent to General Millikin that<br />
Grow’s division would probably have to<br />
continue its attack alone. He t<strong>here</strong>fore<br />
extended the 6th Armored front to the<br />
right so that on the evening of 1 January<br />
it reached from Bourcy on the north to<br />
Br<strong>as</strong> in the south. General Grow imme-<br />
diately brought his extra tank battalion<br />
and armored infantry battalion forward<br />
from CCR to beef up the combat com-<br />
mands on the line. Every tank, gun, and<br />
man would be needed.<br />
The new and wider front would bring<br />
the 167th Volks Grenadier Division into<br />
action against the 6th Armored south of<br />
Neffe. But this w<strong>as</strong> not all. At the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> conference on the 29th one<br />
of the SS officers present w<strong>as</strong> General<br />
Priess, commander of the I SS Panzer<br />
Corps. He w<strong>as</strong> t<strong>here</strong> because Manteuffel<br />
expected to re-create this corps, <strong>as</strong> it had<br />
existed in the first days of the offensive,<br />
by bringing the 12th SS Panzer Division<br />
in from the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> and<br />
joining to it the 1st SS Panzer Division,<br />
at the moment moving toward Lutrebois.<br />
The subsequent failure at Lutrebois w<strong>as</strong><br />
overshadowed by the American threat to<br />
the Panzer Lehr and Fuehrer Begleit<br />
west of B<strong>as</strong>togne, and on the l<strong>as</strong>t day of<br />
December Manteuffel ordered Priess to<br />
take over in this sector, promising that<br />
the 12th SS Panzer shortly would arrive<br />
to flesh out the new I SS Panzer Corps.<br />
BED SHEETS DONATED BY VILLAGERS camouflage 6th Armored Division vehicles.
632 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
On the afternoon of New Year’s Day<br />
Priess had just finished briefing his three<br />
subordinate commanders for a counter-<br />
attack to be started in the next few<br />
hours when a message arrived from Man-<br />
teuffel: the 12th SS Panzer w<strong>as</strong> detached<br />
from his command and Priess himself<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to report to the army headquarters<br />
pronto. The two generals met about<br />
1800. By this hour the full account of<br />
the 6th Armored attack w<strong>as</strong> available<br />
and the threat to the weakened 26th<br />
Volks Grenadier Division could be <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sessed. Manteuffel ordered Priess to take<br />
over the fight in the 26th sector at noon<br />
on 2 January, and told him that his corps<br />
would be given the 12th SS Panzer, the<br />
26th Volks Grenadier Division, and the<br />
340th Volks Grenadier Division, which<br />
w<strong>as</strong> en route from Aachen.<br />
The 6th Armored Division would be<br />
given some respite, however. When Field<br />
Marshal Model arrived to look over the<br />
plans for the counterattack, on the after-<br />
noon of the 2d, only a small tank force<br />
had come in from the 12th SS Panzer,<br />
and the main body of the 340th w<strong>as</strong> pro-<br />
gressing so slowly that Model set the<br />
attack date <strong>as</strong> 4 January. He promised<br />
also to give Priess the 9th SS Panzer<br />
Division for added punch. It must be<br />
said that Manteuffel’s part in these opti-<br />
mistic plans w<strong>as</strong> much against his own<br />
professional judgment.<br />
Faced with a front normally consid-<br />
ered too wide for a linear advance by<br />
armor, General Grow put five t<strong>as</strong>k forces<br />
into the attack on 2 January, holding<br />
only one in reserve. The boundary be-<br />
tween CCA and CCB w<strong>as</strong> defined by the<br />
railroad line which once had linked<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne, Benonchamps, and Wiltz.<br />
CCB now had two tank battalions (the<br />
68th and 69th) plus the 50th Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion to throw in on the<br />
north wing; CCA got the two fresh bat-<br />
talions from CCR.<br />
About one o’clock on the morning of<br />
the 2d the Luftwaffe began bombing the<br />
6th Armored area. Although the German<br />
planes had been more conspicuous by<br />
their absence than their presence during<br />
the p<strong>as</strong>t days, it seemed that a few could<br />
always be gotten up <strong>as</strong> a token gesture<br />
when a large German ground attack w<strong>as</strong><br />
forming. (For example, on 30 December<br />
the Luftwaffe had supported the e<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
and western attacks with great imparti-<br />
ality by dropping its bombs on B<strong>as</strong>togne,<br />
the most concentrated air punishment<br />
the town received during the entire bat-<br />
tle. CCB, 10th Armored, w<strong>as</strong> bombed<br />
out of its headquarters, and a large por-<br />
tion of the Belgian population sought<br />
safety in flight.) While the German<br />
planes were droning overhead, dark<br />
shapes, incre<strong>as</strong>ing in number, were ob-<br />
served against the snow near Wardin.<br />
These were a battalion of the 167th<br />
Volks Grenadier forming for a counter-<br />
attack. Nine battalions of field artillery<br />
began TOT fire over Wardin, and the<br />
enemy force melted away. Just to the<br />
north, but in the CCB sector, the ad-<br />
vance guard of the 340th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division made its initial appearance<br />
about 0200 on the 2d, penetrated the<br />
American outpost line, and broke into<br />
Mageret. The skirmish l<strong>as</strong>ted for a<br />
couple of hours, but the Luftwaffe gave<br />
the defenders a hand by bombing its own<br />
German troops.<br />
In midmorning the 68th Tank Battal-<br />
ion sortied from Mageret to climb the<br />
road toward Arloncourt, the objective of<br />
the previous day. The paving w<strong>as</strong> cov-<br />
ered with ice and the slopes were too<br />
slippery and steep for the steel tank
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 633<br />
treads; so the armored engineers went to<br />
work scattering straw on all the inclines.<br />
Finally, Company B came within sight<br />
of the village, but the Germans were<br />
ready–Nebelwerfers and <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
gave the quietus to eight Shermans. The<br />
enemy guns were camouflaged with<br />
white paint and the snow capes worn by<br />
the gunners, and the supporting infantry<br />
blended discreetly with the landscape.<br />
So successful w<strong>as</strong> the deception that<br />
when a company of Shermans and a com-<br />
pany of light tanks hurried forward to<br />
<strong>as</strong>sist Company B, they were taken under<br />
fire on an arc of 220 degrees. Colonel<br />
Davall radioed for a box barrage and<br />
smoke screen; Riley’s gunners met the<br />
request in a matter of seconds and the<br />
68th got out of the trap.<br />
Farther north, and advancing on a<br />
route almost at a right angle to that<br />
followed by the 68th, the 50th Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion pried a few grena-<br />
diers out of the cellars in Oubourcy and<br />
marched on to Michamps. The reception<br />
w<strong>as</strong> quite different <strong>here</strong>. As Wall’s in-<br />
fantry entered Michamps the enemy<br />
countered with machine gun bursts<br />
thickened by howitzer and Werfer fire<br />
coming in from the higher ground<br />
around Bourcy. This time twelve artil-<br />
lery battalions joined in to support the<br />
50th. At sunset German tanks could be<br />
seen moving about in Bourcy and Colo-<br />
nel Wall, whose force w<strong>as</strong> out alone on<br />
a limb, abandoned both Michamps and<br />
Oubourcy. (Wall himself w<strong>as</strong> partially<br />
blinded by a Nebelwerfer shell and w<strong>as</strong><br />
evacuated.) The German tanks, two<br />
companies of the 12th SS Panzer which<br />
had just arrived from west of B<strong>as</strong>togne,<br />
followed <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Oubourcy.<br />
South of the rail line the 15th Tank<br />
Battalion (Lt. Col. Embrey D. Lagrew)<br />
came forward in the morning to p<strong>as</strong>s<br />
through Brown’s 44th Armored Infantry<br />
Battalion, but this march w<strong>as</strong> a long one<br />
from Remichampagne and it w<strong>as</strong> nearly<br />
noon before the 15th attack got under<br />
way. On the right the 9th Armored In-<br />
fantry Battalion (Lt. Col. Frank K.<br />
Britton) came in to take over the fight<br />
the 44th had been waging in the woods<br />
near Wardin. It w<strong>as</strong> planned that the<br />
armored infantry would sweep the en-<br />
emy out of the wooded ridges which<br />
overlooked Wardin from the southwest<br />
and south, w<strong>here</strong>upon the tank force<br />
would storm the village from the north.<br />
Britton’s battalion w<strong>as</strong> caught in an<br />
artillery barrage during the p<strong>as</strong>sage of<br />
lines with Brown, became disorganized,<br />
and did not resume the advance until<br />
noon. Shortly t<strong>here</strong>after the 9th w<strong>as</strong> mis-<br />
takenly brought under fire by the 134th<br />
Infantry. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no radio communi-<br />
cation between Lagrew and Britton,<br />
probably because of the broken terrain,<br />
and Lagrew re<strong>as</strong>oned that because of his<br />
own delay the infantry attack must have<br />
reached its objective. The tanks of the<br />
15th Tank Battalion gat<strong>here</strong>d in the<br />
woods northwest of Wardin, then struck<br />
for the village, but the German antitank<br />
guns on the surrounding ridges did some<br />
expert shooting and destroyed seven of<br />
Lagrew’s tanks. Nonetheless a platoon<br />
from Company C of the 9th, attached<br />
to Lagrew’s battalion, made its way into<br />
Wardin and remained t<strong>here</strong> most of the<br />
night. All this while the 9th Armored<br />
Infantry Battalion w<strong>as</strong> engaged in a<br />
heartbreaking series of <strong>as</strong>saults to bre<strong>as</strong>t<br />
the machine gun fire sweeping the bar-<br />
ren banks of a small stream bed that<br />
separated the wood lot southwest of<br />
Wardin from another due south. This<br />
indecisive affair cost the 9th one-quarter
634<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
6TH ARMORED DIVISION TANKS IN SNOWSTORM NEAR WARDIN<br />
of its officers and many men.<br />
Despite the heavy losses incurred, the<br />
6th Armored had gained much ground<br />
on 2 January, but it would be another<br />
eight days and the enemy would be in<br />
retreat before these gains would be du-<br />
plicated. The tanks and infantry had<br />
been ably supported by the artillery, but<br />
the division official record is instant in<br />
giving full marks to the fighter-bombers<br />
of the XIX Tactical Air Command, that<br />
old and valued friend which together<br />
with the 6th Armored had patrolled the<br />
long, open flank of the Third <strong>Army</strong><br />
weeks before on the Loire.<br />
That night, when it w<strong>as</strong> clear that<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Brown must be thrust back<br />
into the line to <strong>as</strong>sist the 9th, General<br />
Grow reported to the III Corps com-<br />
mander that his entire division w<strong>as</strong> com-<br />
mitted and that his only reserve w<strong>as</strong> the<br />
single company held out by each of the<br />
two combat commands.<br />
By the close of 2 January it could be<br />
said that the III Corps’ attack had been<br />
carried solely by the 6th Armored Divi-<br />
sion. Even though the German effort to<br />
open a path through the left wing of the<br />
35th Infantry Division at Lutrebois had<br />
failed in its intended purpose, it had<br />
achieved an important secondary effect,<br />
becoming, <strong>as</strong> it did, a true spoiling<br />
attack that put the 35th out of the<br />
running from 31 December on. The<br />
main battle positions held by Baade’s
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 635<br />
division (which had now<strong>here</strong> been bro-<br />
ken by the 1st SS Panzer) followed the<br />
trace of a wide, lopsided V, reaching<br />
from Marvie in the northe<strong>as</strong>t to a point<br />
west of Villers-la-Bonne-Eau, then back<br />
southe<strong>as</strong>t to Bavigne. Before the 35th<br />
could regain its stride, it would be neces-<br />
sary to reduce the opposition that had<br />
flared up at three points: Lutrebois,<br />
Villers-la-Bonne-Eau (w<strong>here</strong> the two<br />
companies from the 137th Infantry had<br />
been entrapped), and Harlange.<br />
On the left wing the 2d and 3d Bat-<br />
talions of the 134th watched through the<br />
morning hours of 31 December while<br />
the corps artillery fired TOT’S on Lutre-<br />
bois, then rose from the foxhole line to<br />
renew the <strong>as</strong>sault e<strong>as</strong>tward. As the 2d<br />
Battalion tried to move out across the<br />
valley, it made a perfect target for the<br />
small arms fire sweeping in from<br />
the opposing wooded crest, took ninety<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties, and fell back. The 3d Bat-<br />
talion made a p<strong>as</strong>s at Lutrebois, but the<br />
fire from the woods covering the high<br />
ground to the northe<strong>as</strong>t barred entrance<br />
to the village.<br />
The entire regiment joined the attack<br />
on 1 January. Now it w<strong>as</strong> going up<br />
against the 167th Volks Grenadier Divi-<br />
sion, which finally had entered the line<br />
in its entirety (relieving the 1st SS Pan-<br />
zer) and w<strong>as</strong> deployed on the right wing<br />
of the LIII Corps opposite Marvie and<br />
Lutremange. On the left the 1st Battal-<br />
ion, separated by three thousand yards<br />
from the neighboring 3d, set out from<br />
Marvie to bring the division flank for-<br />
ward and neutralize the German hold on<br />
the ridges overlooking Lutrebois. The<br />
veteran 167th, however, quickly sensed<br />
the gap in the American line and cut<br />
through to the rear of the 1st; nor did<br />
the 3d have any better luck at Lutrebois.<br />
In the afternoon the 2d Battalion <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
had put Companies E and G across the<br />
valley and into the woods, when a sharp<br />
German riposte struck the two compa-<br />
nies, isolating them completely by night-<br />
fall. Next morning the two American<br />
companies broke loose, and the 3d Bat-<br />
talion again attacked across the open<br />
space west of the village to seize a few<br />
buildings from which to build up the<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault. Finally coming within yards of<br />
the first house, Company K w<strong>as</strong> pinned<br />
down by a machine gun firing from one<br />
of the windows. A platoon leader left<br />
his men, climbed to the roof, and tossed<br />
down a hand grenade. With this build-<br />
ing in hand the American infantry began<br />
methodically to clear Lutrebois (a two-<br />
day t<strong>as</strong>k <strong>as</strong> it turned out) while corps<br />
artillery put more TOT fire on the<br />
sections of the village still occupied by<br />
the enemy.<br />
E<strong>as</strong>t of Marvie the 1st Battalion had<br />
to delay its advance in order to dig out<br />
the grenadiers who had settled them-<br />
selves in the woods to the rear. Eventu-<br />
ally the battalion started forward and,<br />
for the first time, made physical contact<br />
with the 6th Armored-after mistakenly<br />
starting a fire fight with Britton’s ar-<br />
mored infantry. By the end of 2 January<br />
the left wing of the 35th Division w<strong>as</strong><br />
beginning to inch forward, but the ter-<br />
rain features set for seizure by the III<br />
Corps commander-two 510-meter hills<br />
on a thrust line bearing generally north-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t from Lutrebois–would prove to be<br />
days away.<br />
The 137th Infantry had hopes on 31<br />
December that its two rifle companies<br />
still were in Villers-la-Bonne-Eau, but<br />
all attempts at relief were thwarted by<br />
the 14th Parachute Regiment, decimated<br />
though it w<strong>as</strong>, in the surrounding woods.
636 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
MEDICS OF 35TH DIVISION REMOVIG CASUALTIES FROM LUTREBOIS<br />
(Actually Companies K and L already<br />
had surrendered to flame throwers and<br />
tanks.) That night Colonel Murray<br />
wrote off the two companies, but no mat-<br />
ter what the c<strong>as</strong>e Villers-la-Bonne-Eau<br />
had to be taken before the road net to<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t could be opened. So it w<strong>as</strong> that<br />
on 1 January the 137th Infantry com-<br />
menced what its official history would<br />
call the roughest battle ever fought by<br />
the regiment–ten days of bloodletting<br />
and frustration. In this the 137th would<br />
have yeoman help from the troopers of<br />
the 6th Cavalry Squadron, fighting dis-<br />
mounted and–the GI’s accolade–“like<br />
infantry.” The understrength 14th Para-<br />
chute Regiment had recovered suffi-<br />
ciently from its dis<strong>as</strong>trous experience at<br />
the hands of the 4th Armored to fight a<br />
tenacious defensive action through the<br />
woods and the deep snow in the fields.<br />
After crossing the Sure River and<br />
taking B<strong>as</strong>chleiden, the 320th Infantry<br />
had continued the march north along<br />
the road to Harlange, the only negoti-<br />
able avenue of advance <strong>here</strong> on the right<br />
flank of the 35th Division. On 29 Decem-<br />
ber the 2d Battalion w<strong>as</strong> hit hard by fire<br />
coming from a collection of farm build-<br />
ings (Fuhrman Farm) at a jog in the<br />
road w<strong>here</strong> it <strong>as</strong>cended a ridge a thou-<br />
sand yards southe<strong>as</strong>t of Harlange. That<br />
night the 320th reported that it w<strong>as</strong><br />
“locked in a bitter battle” at the farm-<br />
stead and in the neighboring woods. 17<br />
17 Sgt. H. L. Luther w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC<br />
for personally killing or capturing the enemy
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 637<br />
Here stood the 15th Parachute Regi-<br />
ment, which had come through the<br />
debacle south of B<strong>as</strong>togne in good shape<br />
and w<strong>as</strong>, in the opinion of the higher<br />
command, “well in hand.” The German<br />
counterattack leveled against the rest of<br />
the division on 30 December did not ex-<br />
tend to the 320th Infantry, but did re-<br />
sult in delaying a full-bodied American<br />
attempt to break through at Harlange<br />
until the first day of January. At that<br />
time the division commander turned the<br />
reserve battalion of the 320th over to the<br />
137th, leaving Colonel Byrne to fight<br />
the battle with only the 2d and 3d Bat-<br />
talions.<br />
Neither the 320th nor the 15th Para-<br />
chute had tank support; this would be<br />
an infantry battle with infantry weapons<br />
-principally the rifle and the machine<br />
gun. In the afternoon the battle flared<br />
up around Fuhrman Farm but left the<br />
attackers with nothing but their losses.<br />
Another series of <strong>as</strong>saults the following<br />
day w<strong>as</strong> equally unsuccessful. That night<br />
the 320th got some ple<strong>as</strong>ant news-nine<br />
tanks were on their way to join the<br />
attack. Across the lines the German<br />
corps commander, General von Roth-<br />
kirch, w<strong>as</strong> doing his best to find a few<br />
tanks for the paratroopers. The two<br />
opposing regimental commanders must<br />
have wondered which would be first to<br />
break the infantry deadlock.<br />
The Lone Battle of the 26th Division<br />
The right wing of the III Corps had<br />
been brought forward on 27 December<br />
when General Paul’s 26th Division put<br />
its leading battalions across the Sure<br />
occupants of three dugouts during the affray at<br />
Harlange.<br />
River. Wiltz, the division objective, w<strong>as</strong><br />
only a little more than four air-line<br />
miles to the north. The immediate<br />
objective remained the Wiltz-B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
highway, which meandered at distances<br />
of two and three miles from the Sure<br />
crossings. The approach to the target<br />
sector of the highway south of Wiltz w<strong>as</strong><br />
constricted to three poor, narrow roads<br />
that near their entrance were dominated<br />
by the villages of Bavigne, Liefrange,<br />
and Kaundorf respectively–this array<br />
west to e<strong>as</strong>t–and which converged in an<br />
apex touching the main highway at<br />
Nothum and a crossroads farmstead<br />
known <strong>as</strong> Mont Schumann. The battle<br />
commencing on 27 December would<br />
evolve, <strong>as</strong> the division neared Wiltz, into<br />
a series of pitched fights for blocks of<br />
high ground, which were so sharply<br />
etched by interlacing deep draws and<br />
ravines that a sweep forward on a solid<br />
division front w<strong>as</strong> impossible. 18 Tacti-<br />
cally the 26th Division faced a lone<br />
battle, for its western neighbor, the 35th,<br />
had fed into the III Corps front in a<br />
column of regiments, turning under<br />
German pressure from column into line<br />
on a northwest-southe<strong>as</strong>t axis instead of<br />
forming on the left flank of Paul’s divi-<br />
sion. The tie with the XII Corps on the<br />
right w<strong>as</strong> equally tenuous, for the 80th<br />
Division w<strong>as</strong> forging due north while<br />
the 26th would gravitate toward the<br />
northwest. General Paul’s problem, then,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to flesh out the III Corps attack<br />
while at the same time guarding both of<br />
his exposed flanks.<br />
18 The reports on this period of battle <strong>as</strong> found<br />
in the division and regimental AAR’s are very<br />
sparse, but the G–3 and S–3 journals are useful.<br />
The combat interviews give quite extensive cover-<br />
age. See also the 735th Tank Battalion AAR,<br />
December 194.
638<br />
The leading companies of the 101st<br />
Infantry scaled the steep slopes on the<br />
north bank of the Sure during the night<br />
of 26 December, and a couple of hours<br />
after midnight Company I reported that<br />
it held Liefrange, the sally port onto the<br />
center of the three cart roads leading<br />
northward. Apparently the German<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> had not yet been apprised<br />
of the crossings at the Sure, for in the<br />
early hours of the 27th Major von Cour-<br />
biere, acting commander of the Fuehrer<br />
Grenadier Brigade, w<strong>as</strong> dispatched with<br />
two rifle battalions and a few tanks to<br />
bar a crossing at Liefrange. This Ger-<br />
man foray struck Liefrange at about<br />
0720 and momentarily ruled the field.<br />
But any hope of sweeping the north<br />
bank clear of the Americans evaporated<br />
when a dozen artillery battalions took<br />
the grenadiers under fire, followed less<br />
than two hours later by the Allied<br />
fighter-bombers.<br />
In the meantime the 26th Division<br />
engineers rushed the l<strong>as</strong>t sections of a<br />
vehicular bridge into position north of<br />
Bonnal. By 0900 the bridge w<strong>as</strong> ready<br />
and tanks and tank destroyers rumbled<br />
across to support the riflemen. North-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of Liefrange two companies of the<br />
3d Battalion, 101st, climbed the hill at<br />
Kaundorf, the highest ground in the<br />
area, but were repelled when von Cour-<br />
biere turned his tanks into Kaundorf and<br />
knocked out half the platoon of Sher-<br />
mans accompanying the Americans. 19 At<br />
19 Capts. John J. Christy and Leland R. Dunham,<br />
commanding the two rifle companies in this fight<br />
and the subsequent recapture of Kaundorf, re-<br />
ceived the DSC. During the night of 27 December<br />
Pvt. R. L. Presser of Company K, 104th Infantry,<br />
swam the Sure River under fire carrying a<br />
wounded comrade from a patrol on the north<br />
bank. Presser w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
best, however, the understrength battal-<br />
ions of the Fuehrer Grenadier Brigade<br />
could only inflict delay now that the<br />
American bridges were in operation.<br />
By early afternoon the entire 101st<br />
Infantry w<strong>as</strong> across the river, and when<br />
night fell the bulk of the 104th w<strong>as</strong> on<br />
the north bank taking position to the<br />
right of the 101st on the hills e<strong>as</strong>t of<br />
Kaundorf. <strong>To</strong> make his left wing secure,<br />
General Paul ordered the 101st to take<br />
Bavigne during the night of the 27th<br />
and told the commanders of the two<br />
regiments on the north bank to begin<br />
a co-ordinated attack at 0800 on the 28th.<br />
Company C of the 101st did shoot its<br />
way into Bavigne before midnight but<br />
took most of the next morning to root<br />
out the l<strong>as</strong>t of the German grenadiers.<br />
Late on the 27th the 2d Battalion of<br />
the 101st Infantry had forged well ahead<br />
of the other American units, halting for<br />
the night outside Nothum near the apex<br />
of the secondary road net in the division<br />
zone. At this point the battalion encoun-<br />
tered tank fire, and when it moved<br />
forward for the attack on the 28th it<br />
became clear that the German tanks<br />
would have to be destroyed or driven off<br />
before Nothum could be taken. Some<br />
hours p<strong>as</strong>sed <strong>here</strong> while the American<br />
tanks and tank destroyers maneuvered<br />
and dueled with the Germans, but in<br />
the late afternoon the way w<strong>as</strong> clear and<br />
the infantry fought their way into and<br />
through the village. Earlier in the day<br />
the 3d Battalion of the 101st had retaken<br />
Kaundorf and started a drive with its<br />
companies abre<strong>as</strong>t to clear the woods<br />
along the road to Nothum. 20 During the<br />
20 During this advance 2d Lt. G. F. Pennington<br />
of Company E knocked out an enemy armored<br />
car with a rocket although mortally wounded. He<br />
w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC posthumously.
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 639<br />
morning the leading companies of the<br />
104th Infantry set out to seize Buder-<br />
scheid but came under extremely heavy<br />
fire from enemy dug in on some wooded<br />
heights e<strong>as</strong>t of the village. The capture<br />
of Kaundorf, however, permitted a flank-<br />
ing move against this German pocket,<br />
so Companies F and G, accompanied by<br />
tanks, swung west and north, the enemy<br />
decamping <strong>as</strong> the envelopment of Buder-<br />
scheid became apparent. On the whole<br />
the progress made during the day w<strong>as</strong><br />
satisfying, but the division came to an<br />
abrupt halt just before midnight with<br />
the word from corps headquarters that<br />
the enemy would launch a counterattack<br />
from the northe<strong>as</strong>t on the morning of<br />
the 29th.<br />
A TOWN EN ROUTE TO KAUNDORF<br />
The anticipated counterattack, prob-<br />
ably conjured up by the inability of<br />
Allied air reconnaissance to function<br />
during bad flying weather late on the<br />
28th, failed to appear. Paul waited until<br />
1015, then telephoned the two regimen-<br />
tal commanders to resume the advance.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no longer any possibility of<br />
a full-bodied division attack. With both<br />
division flanks exposed the 328th Infan-<br />
try had to be kept in the division com-<br />
mander’s hand <strong>as</strong> reserve, and the 101st<br />
and 104th would have to move with<br />
battalions echeloned rearward out to the<br />
wings. Furthermore, visibility on the<br />
ground had dwindled so that visual con-<br />
tact between companies w<strong>as</strong> almost non-<br />
existent.
640 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
But the Wiltz River crossing-and the<br />
town itself–were not so far away. (At<br />
midnight on the 28th the corps and divi-<br />
sion artillery commenced to fire TOT’S<br />
against Wiltz.) Paul ordered the two<br />
regiments to get patrols to the river but<br />
not to descend in strength into the Wiltz<br />
valley. The initial t<strong>as</strong>k at hand would be<br />
to clear the enemy pockets from the<br />
wooded high ground to the division<br />
front and cut the highway to B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
This fight on the hills would be one at<br />
close range with opposing rifle com-<br />
panies and platoons gone to ground and<br />
entrenched only 75 to 150 yards apart.<br />
The 101st began its advance at noon<br />
on the 29th, the immediate goal being<br />
to take the high ground north of Berle<br />
and the Schumann crossroads which<br />
commanded the highway. Here, <strong>as</strong> else-<br />
w<strong>here</strong> along the division front, the<br />
enemy made up for his lack of riflemen<br />
with constant and accurate fire from dug-<br />
in tanks and Nebelwerfers, reinforced at<br />
likely points by a few 88’s. Despite the<br />
presence of the division 105-mm. howitz-<br />
ers, which had been pushed to within<br />
fifteen hundred yards of the rifle line,<br />
the 101st made little headway. At night-<br />
fall Company A had reached a point five<br />
hundred yards south of Berle, but Com-<br />
pany B had run into serious trouble and<br />
the 2d Battalion had been pinned down<br />
by direct fire not far from Nothum. The<br />
1st and 2d Battalions of the 104th Infan-<br />
try, faced with direct tank fire, made no<br />
substantial progress, although patrols in<br />
front of the attack wave did reach the<br />
woods southwest of Nocher and elements<br />
of the 1st reached a ridge overlooking<br />
the town of Wiltz. 21<br />
21 Sgt. B. R. E<strong>as</strong>tburn of Company C, 104th<br />
Infantry, w<strong>as</strong> leading a platoon in the attack<br />
which came under intense machine gun fire and<br />
The two-regiment attack on the morn-<br />
ing of 30 December got off to a f<strong>as</strong>t start,<br />
the orders now to “secure Wiltz.” On the<br />
left the 101st Infantry met little but<br />
small arms fire and the 3d Battalion set<br />
up a roadblock on the Wiltz highway.<br />
The regiment gat<strong>here</strong>d 140 prisoners<br />
from the 9th Volks Grenadier Division<br />
in its sweep through the woods north<br />
and west of the highway. The enemy,<br />
however, had no intention of allowing<br />
a parade march down into the Wiltz<br />
valley. An hour before dusk a German<br />
counterattack drove Companies I and K,<br />
the leaders, back onto the hill rising at<br />
the junction of the Wiltz and Roullingen<br />
roads. T<strong>here</strong> followed a period of quiet,<br />
and then in the dark the grenadiers<br />
struck again. This time they were in bat-<br />
talion strength and had three or four<br />
tanks to harden the blow. Companies I<br />
and K took a substantial number of c<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ualties and were left so disorganized that<br />
the regimental commander <strong>as</strong>ked Paul<br />
to delay the attack scheduled for the next<br />
morning in order to get the 3d Battalion<br />
straightened out.<br />
The 104th Infantry ran into trouble<br />
in the first minutes of its advance on the<br />
30th. Both <strong>as</strong>sault battalions were mov-<br />
ing against enemy troops well established<br />
on the wooded high ground north of<br />
Buderscheid, and both came under an<br />
unusually heavy amount of tank and<br />
Nebelwerfer fire. Clearly enemy resist-<br />
ance in this sector w<strong>as</strong> stiffening. Lt. Col.<br />
could not move forward. E<strong>as</strong>tburn “borrowed”<br />
another platoon and wiped out the machine gun<br />
nests. He received the DSC. Pfc. S. E. Hull, a<br />
member of the same company, broke up a German<br />
tank attack when he crawled forward with a<br />
bazooka and, at thirty-five yards’ range, destroyed<br />
the lead panzer. Hull put in another rocket<br />
which killed the second tank, and thus ended<br />
the attack. Hull w<strong>as</strong> awarded the DSC.
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 641<br />
Calvin A. Heath’s 2d Battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
pinned down almost at once at a cross-<br />
road and, under direct tank fire, could<br />
not work its way around the German<br />
pocket. The 1st Battalion briefly gained<br />
control of a crest to its front but then w<strong>as</strong><br />
driven off by a savage attack which en-<br />
gulfed parts of Companies A and C.<br />
Paul ordered the 3d Battalion of the<br />
328th Infantry up from reserve to back<br />
the 104th, and the Americans regained<br />
some of the ground lost north of Buder-<br />
scheid. When the day ended, however,<br />
the enemy intention to hold this part of<br />
the line w<strong>as</strong> underscored by a sudden<br />
and considerable incre<strong>as</strong>e in artillery<br />
fire.<br />
The exposed condition of the 26th<br />
Division salient, <strong>as</strong> the year ended, is<br />
accurately described in the regimental<br />
orders issued to the 101st Infantry:<br />
“Each Battalion will be prepared to<br />
meet counterattacks from the north,<br />
northwest and northe<strong>as</strong>t.” The first of<br />
these anticipated thrusts came at the<br />
101st roadblock about 0530 on 31 De-<br />
cember, commencing a battle which<br />
embroiled both the 1st and 3d Battalions<br />
and l<strong>as</strong>ted all day long. The main Ger-<br />
man effort seems to have been directed<br />
at the 3d Battalion roadblock southwest<br />
of Roullingen, and <strong>as</strong> a result Companies<br />
I and K, much weakened by the mauling<br />
received the previous day, took the first<br />
blows. As the German attack gained<br />
momentum, Colonel Scott ordered the<br />
two companies to fall back on the fox-<br />
hole line dug earlier south of the Roul-<br />
lingen road. Light tanks and tank de-<br />
stroyers sent forward to help the 101st<br />
could made no headway, nor could they<br />
maneuver. on the icy roads. The enemy,<br />
however, had no tanks in action, and by<br />
noon the 2d Battalion line w<strong>as</strong> stabi-<br />
lized. Now the 2d Battalion took over<br />
the fight on the left wing of the 101st,<br />
moving forward behind a rolling bar-<br />
rage to clear the woods north of No-<br />
thum. This attack made progress, but<br />
once again <strong>as</strong> dusk came on the enemy<br />
counterattacked. Company G, which had<br />
entered the woods to support the two<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault companies t<strong>here</strong>, either ran into<br />
the German advance or lost its way and<br />
w<strong>as</strong> encircled; only half the company<br />
escaped.<br />
The 104th Infantry lay on 31 Decem-<br />
ber with its right facing along the Buder-<br />
scheid-Wiltz road and its left facing<br />
north along and overlooking the Roul-<br />
lingen sector of the Bavigne-Wiltz road.<br />
Much of its strength had been diverted<br />
for the long north-south blocking line<br />
which guarded the division–and corps–<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t flank, but a battalion of the 328th<br />
Infantry w<strong>as</strong> moving by truck and on<br />
foot to take over this t<strong>as</strong>k. Although the<br />
104th Infantry had an attack mission and<br />
did push out a little through the woods<br />
to the north, most of the day w<strong>as</strong> spent in<br />
an inconclusive fire fight.<br />
At the close of the year the 26th Divi-<br />
sion lay in a wedge, the 101st Infantry<br />
at the point around Nothum, the 104th<br />
on the right facing the diagonal formed<br />
by the Buderscheid section of the high-<br />
way, and the 328th (–) on the division<br />
left in the neighborhood of Bavigne.<br />
Both flanks of the division still were ex-<br />
posed and the troops were deployed on a<br />
very wide front, considering the broken<br />
character of the ground.<br />
The old enemy–the Fuehrer Grena-<br />
dier–had withdrawn during the l<strong>as</strong>t<br />
nights of December to go into the Sev-<br />
enth <strong>Army</strong> reserve at Wiltz, its place<br />
being taken by the 9th Volks Grenadier<br />
Division (Colonel Kolb) . The 9th had
642<br />
been formed <strong>as</strong> one of the first German<br />
<strong>Army</strong> divisions in 1935 but no longer<br />
bore much resemblance to the formation<br />
that had fought in France and Russia.<br />
Almost completely destroyed during the<br />
withdrawal from Rumania, the 9th<br />
Volks Grenadier w<strong>as</strong> reorganized and<br />
trained in Denmark, whence it w<strong>as</strong> trans-<br />
ferred to the Seventh <strong>Army</strong>. The very<br />
first battalion to arrive in the Sure area<br />
had been put into action to help the<br />
Fuehrer Grenadier and had been wiped<br />
out, a traumatic experience from which<br />
the rest of the division never seems to<br />
have fully recovered.<br />
With the 6th Armored advance just<br />
getting under way on 1 January and the<br />
35th Division grappled by the enemy in<br />
a seesaw battle, General Millikin gave<br />
orders for the 26th Division to attack on<br />
the 2d and cut the Wiltz-B<strong>as</strong>togne high-<br />
way, which w<strong>as</strong> supporting not only the<br />
German Seventh <strong>Army</strong> but a portion of<br />
the enemy build-up e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne.<br />
General Paul determined to use his en-<br />
tire division in this operation. The two<br />
flank regiments were intended to make<br />
holding attacks only, leaving it to the<br />
101st–in the center–to thrust northe<strong>as</strong>t<br />
from Nothum and seize Hill 490, the<br />
latter just beyond the wooded junction<br />
w<strong>here</strong> a secondary road from Roullingen<br />
met the main highway winding up from<br />
the Wiltz valley. By this time the 26th<br />
Division had learned the hard way what<br />
an attack over hills and ravines, through<br />
underbrush, tangled woods, and snow-<br />
drifts-with little room for maneuver-<br />
w<strong>as</strong> like. General Paul arranged for the<br />
corps and division artillery to curtain the<br />
advance with a “rolling barrage of high<br />
intensity.” This tactic w<strong>as</strong> made e<strong>as</strong>ier<br />
because only one rifle battalion (the 2d,<br />
101st Infantry) would make the <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
-and in column of companies–into the<br />
triangle w<strong>here</strong> Hill 490 lay.<br />
The 2d Battalion jumped off in the<br />
attack at daybreak and hit the German<br />
outpost line just north of Mont Schu-<br />
mann. <strong>To</strong>ward the hill objective, less<br />
than a thousand yards ahead, the ad-<br />
vance could move only at a crawl, for<br />
t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> little space for maneuver on<br />
either side of the road. Roadblock fol-<br />
lowed roadblock, and the rifle companies<br />
had to squeeze p<strong>as</strong>t each other <strong>as</strong> the<br />
leader w<strong>as</strong> pinned down by enemy tank<br />
and machine gun fire. A few of the<br />
American tank destroyers were able to<br />
find firing positions from which to en-<br />
gage the forward German tanks but<br />
could not get close enough to bl<strong>as</strong>t the<br />
panzers, which had been hidden in<br />
“trench garages” around the crown of<br />
Hill 490. By noon the 2d Battalion had<br />
come to a standstill and w<strong>as</strong> completely<br />
fought out. General Paul ordered up his<br />
division reserve, the 3d Battalion of the<br />
328th, to take a crack at the enemy in<br />
the tough triangle.<br />
This abrupt renewal of activity in<br />
front of Wiltz had a much greater im-<br />
pact on the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> than a battal-<br />
ion attack normally would occ<strong>as</strong>ion.<br />
General Brandenberger and his chief of<br />
staff, General von Gersdorff, had become<br />
gravely concerned lest the American<br />
attacks around Marvie and Harlange<br />
should suddenly break through and trap<br />
the 5th Parachute Division in what the<br />
Germans now were calling “the Har-<br />
lange pocket.” The renewal of the 26th<br />
Division attack on 2 January and the<br />
threat to the B<strong>as</strong>togne-Wiltz road in-<br />
cre<strong>as</strong>ed this apprehension about the<br />
possibly precarious position of the 5th<br />
Parachute and the link it furnished be-<br />
tween the Seventh and Fifth Panzer
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE<br />
Armies. As a result General Branden-<br />
berger <strong>as</strong>ked Model’s permission to pull<br />
his troops back from Villers-la-Bonne-<br />
Eau and Harlange, but Model gave a<br />
nay, reminding the importunate army<br />
commander that Germany now w<strong>as</strong><br />
in a battle of attrition by which<br />
the Allies would become enmeshed and<br />
ground down.<br />
The VIII Corps’ Attack Continues<br />
The pitched battle with the 87th Divi-<br />
sion’s 345th Infantry at Moircy on the<br />
night of 30 December had involved the<br />
reserve tanks and infantry supporting<br />
the thin-spread 902d, which w<strong>as</strong> holding<br />
the Panzer Lehr left flank, and during<br />
the next afternoon the 345th captured<br />
Remagne without sustaining the usual<br />
counterattack. For a relatively untried<br />
outfit that had ridden a hundred miles,<br />
crowded in jolting trucks, and had gone<br />
into an attack over unfamiliar terrain<br />
all in the space of less than twenty hours,<br />
the 345th had done well. But it had<br />
taken many c<strong>as</strong>ualties, and now that the<br />
fresh 347th Infantry (Col. Sevier R.<br />
Tupper) had come up General Culin<br />
turned the advance on the division right<br />
wing over to the latter. The 346th con-<br />
tinued its blocking mission at St. Hubert<br />
and Vesqueville. (Even the move into<br />
reserve cost the 345th lives and equip-<br />
ment, for the constant traffic uncovered<br />
and exploded German mines which ear-<br />
lier had lain harmless under the deep<br />
snow.)<br />
The morning of 1 January came with<br />
snow, sleet, and bitter cold. The 347th<br />
set out from Moircy and Remagne,<br />
plowing through the drifts, its objective<br />
to cut the B<strong>as</strong>togne-St. Hubert road at<br />
Amberloup. The 1st Battalion (Maj.<br />
643<br />
Cecil Chapman) managed to put patrols<br />
across the highway north of Remagne. It<br />
had been advancing with two tanks in<br />
front of each company and the enemy<br />
reaction through the daylight hours w<strong>as</strong><br />
confined to small arms fire and occ<strong>as</strong>ion-<br />
al bursts of artillery. The 347th, how-<br />
ever, w<strong>as</strong> moving against that part of the<br />
902d line which w<strong>as</strong> backed with armor,<br />
for Bayerlein had put his <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
in to stiffen the Panzer Lehr western<br />
terminus at St. Hubert and placed his<br />
few remaining tanks <strong>as</strong> backstop for the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern flank. At dusk, when the sky w<strong>as</strong><br />
empty of the fighter-bombers, the enemy<br />
tanks struck and drove the 1st Battalion<br />
back toward Remagne.<br />
The 3d Battalion (Lt. Col. Richard D.<br />
Sutton) moved north from Moircy along<br />
the road to Pironpré and at noon took<br />
the intermediate village of Jenneville,<br />
w<strong>here</strong> Company C of the 345th had<br />
suffered a bloody head two days before.<br />
When the battalion defiled from Jenne-<br />
ville the German fire stepped up its<br />
cadence, and now the sharp bark of tank<br />
guns could be heard from Pironpré. The<br />
road junction at the latter point w<strong>as</strong> of<br />
considerable concern to General Bayer-<br />
lein. He could spare only a small detach-<br />
ment of grenadiers (probably no more<br />
than thirty were inside Pironpré) , but<br />
he did put a half dozen tanks into the<br />
defense. These tanks were carefully sited<br />
to give maximum fire and were m<strong>as</strong>ked<br />
from the road by the piles of lumber<br />
surrounding the local sawmill. The<br />
Americans could not locate this opposi-<br />
tion and halted for the night.<br />
Before daybreak the two battalions<br />
went into attack positions close to the<br />
road which ran diagonally from St. Hu-<br />
bert to Morhet, set <strong>as</strong> the regimental line<br />
of departure. They left the hornet’s nest
644 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
at Pironpré undisturbed, moving around<br />
it on the right and left. This second day<br />
of the new year the 347th made progress.<br />
The 1st Battalion captured Gerimont<br />
and the 3d Battalion took Bonnerue, in<br />
the process losing four of its attached<br />
tanks to armor-piercing fire (probably<br />
from the panzers hidden in Pironpré).<br />
But by nightfall it w<strong>as</strong> apparent that a<br />
dangerous gap had been created between<br />
the two battalions, and Colonel Tupper<br />
ordered his reserve battalion to clean out<br />
Pironpré and the thick woods beyond.<br />
The 87th Division now could claim that<br />
the B<strong>as</strong>togne-St. Hubert road had been<br />
pierced because the seizure of Bonnerue<br />
had put a part of the 347th athwart this<br />
highway.<br />
The 11th Armored Division had re-<br />
grouped during the night of 30 Decem-<br />
ber with the object of consolidating the<br />
entire division for a drive north along<br />
the Rechrival valley. CCA moved over<br />
the icy roads south of the Bois des Haies<br />
de Magery, which had separated it from<br />
the rest of the division, and onto the<br />
Neufchâteau-B<strong>as</strong>togne road, w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
columns ran afoul of those of CCB, 6th<br />
Armored. In the morning CCA turned<br />
off the highway and <strong>as</strong>sembled around<br />
Morhet. The new scheme of maneuver<br />
called for CCA to attack in the center<br />
of the valley, erupt from it at Rechrival<br />
and Hubermont, then capture Fla-<br />
mierge. CCR (Col. Virgil Bell) had been<br />
brought up from reserve to cover the<br />
CCA left flank in a sequence of block-<br />
ing positions at Magerotte and Pinsa-<br />
mont w<strong>here</strong> branch roads gave entrance<br />
to the Hubermont road. CCB, still<br />
entangled in the Chenogne fight, had<br />
orders to take that village and proceed<br />
along the e<strong>as</strong>t side of the valley—which<br />
would involve clearing the troublesome<br />
Bois des Valets—until it reached its ob-<br />
jective at Mande-St. Etienne. With Fla-<br />
mierge and Mande-St. Etienne held in<br />
force, the German line of communica-<br />
tions west of B<strong>as</strong>togne would be effec-<br />
tively blocked.<br />
Now that General Kilburn had his<br />
whole division in hand, he took an<br />
optimistic view of the power play to be<br />
made on the 31st Indeed his staff in-<br />
formed the 101st Airborne Division,<br />
with what w<strong>as</strong> pardonable presumption<br />
when a green division w<strong>as</strong> seeking to<br />
impress the veteran and haughty para-<br />
troopers, that Mande-St. Etienne would<br />
be taken by noon. In midmorning CCA<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed CCB’s T<strong>as</strong>k Force Poker, which<br />
had laagered at Brul and Houmont the<br />
evening before and w<strong>as</strong> waiting for T<strong>as</strong>k<br />
Force Pat to get through Chenogne. Near<br />
Rechrival the march w<strong>as</strong> interrupted by<br />
an enemy screening force that had been<br />
deployed by the 3d Panzer Grenadier<br />
to protect its western flank. This detach-<br />
ment, equipped with antitank and <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault guns, w<strong>as</strong> promptly reinforced by<br />
the 115th Regiment of the 15th Panzer<br />
Grenadier (reduced by the bloody attack<br />
west of B<strong>as</strong>togne to battalion strength).<br />
Loosing a series of jabs at the head of<br />
the American column, the 115th used the<br />
Panzerfaust to put a number of tanks<br />
hors de combat. The everready fighter-<br />
bombers intervened to help CCA with a<br />
strike on Rechrival, but in any c<strong>as</strong>e the<br />
American armor carried the weight<br />
necessary to push back the grenadiers,<br />
and after considerable reorganization the<br />
march resumed. Rechrival w<strong>as</strong> found<br />
empty—apparently the Jabos had done<br />
their work well—and the command out-<br />
posted for the night.<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Force Pat turned again to <strong>as</strong>-
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 645<br />
sault Chenogne at noon on the 31st<br />
the armored infantry walking through<br />
knee-deep snow. The Sherman tanks<br />
mired in while attempting to cross a<br />
small creek, but the light tanks and a<br />
platoon of antiaircraft half-tracks wield-<br />
ing the dreaded .50-caliber quads gave<br />
sufficient fire power to force entry at<br />
the edge of the village. Inside w<strong>as</strong> a<br />
scratch garrison recruited from the 39th<br />
Fuesilier Regiment (26th Volks Grena-<br />
dier Division), the 3d Panzer Grenadier,<br />
and Remer’s brigade. The mainstay of<br />
the defense in this sector, however, w<strong>as</strong><br />
a group of twelve to fifteen tank de-<br />
stroyers which had Mark IV carriages<br />
mounting the high-velocity, long-tube<br />
L70 guns. These were brought into ac-<br />
tion late in the day and drove the Amer-<br />
icans out of Chenogne.<br />
CCR carried out the first ph<strong>as</strong>e of its<br />
blocking mission with no opposition,<br />
scoured the woods northwest of Mager-<br />
otte, and gained the ridge t<strong>here</strong>. On the<br />
reverse slope some of Remer’s grena-<br />
diers were entrenched, but the Shermans<br />
machine-gunned the way clear and the<br />
attack moved on to put in the next<br />
block at Pinsamont. German mortar<br />
and artillery fire w<strong>as</strong> so intense <strong>here</strong><br />
(this w<strong>as</strong> a special groupment of weap-<br />
ons which Remer had positioned to<br />
protect his brigade’s flank) that CCR<br />
withdrew to the Magerotte crest line.<br />
That night Remer’s 3d Grenadier Bat-<br />
talion essayed two fruitless counter-<br />
attacks. This rather minor series of<br />
skirmishes on the 31st cost the 55th Ar-<br />
mored Infantry Battalion over eighty<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties.<br />
German action on this date w<strong>as</strong> not<br />
solely directed against the 11th Ar-<br />
mored. T<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> some fighting at<br />
Sibret, although by noontime Field Mar-<br />
shal von Rundstedt’s headquarters had<br />
agreed that any further attempt to break<br />
through the B<strong>as</strong>togne corridor via Sib-<br />
ret would have to await success by the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>tern counterattack force. Surprising-<br />
ly the enemy broke the quiet on the<br />
502d Parachute Infantry front with a<br />
foray directed against Champs. 22 Ac-<br />
tually the attackers were trying to get<br />
a foothold in three houses just outside<br />
the village. The paratroopers reported<br />
two hours of “bitter fighting” before<br />
quiet w<strong>as</strong> restored, for the enemy had<br />
been ably supported by artillery fire.<br />
Thirty prisoners were taken from what<br />
the 502d reported <strong>as</strong> an “<strong>as</strong>sault wave”<br />
of three officers and fifty men. This mi-<br />
nor affair is mentioned <strong>here</strong> only because<br />
it furnishes a very revealing commen-<br />
tary on the state of the German forma-<br />
tions which had been in the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
fight through all the recent days: the<br />
“<strong>as</strong>sault wave” w<strong>as</strong> the total strength of<br />
two rifle companies from the 77th Gren-<br />
adier Regiment of the 26th Volks Gren-<br />
adier Division.<br />
If the 11th Armored attack w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
<strong>click</strong>, the trailing right wing would have<br />
to break through at Chenogne. General<br />
Kilburn ruled that the main effort by<br />
the division on 1 January would be<br />
made by and in support of CCB. This<br />
attack would be co-ordinated with that<br />
of CCA, 9th Armored, which thus far<br />
22<br />
Although the 502d had no offensive mission,<br />
the paratroopers had been involved in continuous<br />
small-scale combat with the enemy in their sector.<br />
During one such affair on 29 December a division<br />
aid man, Pfc. Floyd P. Marquart, went forward un-<br />
der fire to help a paratrooper who had been struck<br />
in the throat by a shell fragment and w<strong>as</strong> slowly<br />
suffocating. Marquart performed an emergency<br />
tracheotomy with his belt knife, then dragged the<br />
wounded man back to a place of safety. He w<strong>as</strong><br />
given the Silver Star.
646 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
w<strong>as</strong> making no headway at Senonchamps the trees.<br />
to the e<strong>as</strong>t. At Chenogne, on the morn- Slow in getting started on 1 January,<br />
ing of the 1st, two medium tank com- CCA had just begun to <strong>as</strong>semble on the<br />
panies made the <strong>as</strong>sault after all the road when it w<strong>as</strong> surprised by a coundivision<br />
artillery had co-operated in terattack led by Remer. Most of the<br />
working the village over. This time the infantry belonging to the Fuehrer Begvillage<br />
w<strong>as</strong> occupied with e<strong>as</strong>e, although leit and its attached <strong>as</strong>sault gun brigade<br />
a few of the Mark IV tank destroyers were in the line screening the western<br />
had lingered long enough to stick their flank of Denkert’s 3d Panzer Grenadier<br />
long barrels out of hayricks and destroy Division, but on the 31st Remer’s tank<br />
four Shermans. During the night the group and one of his grenadier battalcommander<br />
of the 3d Panzer Grenadier, ions had been relieved for a little rest<br />
apprehensive lest the American thrust in the village of Fosset, northwest of<br />
in the valley crumple his supply lines, Hubermont, t<strong>here</strong> becoming the XLVII<br />
had withdrawn his right, leaving most Panzer Corps reserve, Whether Remer<br />
of the large woods between Chenogne or Luettwitz saw this glittering opportuand<br />
Senonchamps unoccupied and re- nity to take the American columns at<br />
ducing the garrisons in the two villages Rechrival by surprise is uncertain. In<br />
to covering shells.<br />
any c<strong>as</strong>e Remer did achieve surprise by<br />
Now for the first time T<strong>as</strong>k Force circling into the Bois des Valets, then<br />
Pat and T<strong>as</strong>k Force Poker could make bursting onto his enemy.<br />
a co-ordinated effort and employ a force Remer’s tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> balanced tactically. The CCB knocked out a considerable number of<br />
fusion w<strong>as</strong> aided in its sweep north American tanks, and the battle went on<br />
through the Bois des Valets by thirteen for three hours before CCA, the 11 th Arbattalions<br />
of artillery whose sustained mored artillery, and the fighter-bombers<br />
fire left a great number of the enemy succeeded in crushing the counterattack.<br />
dead in the woods. Colonel Yale be- At 1530 CCA w<strong>as</strong> moving again. The<br />
lieved that his combat command might fight had removed the sting from the<br />
achieve a quick stroke out of the woods German defense and the American tanks<br />
and seize Mande-St. Etienne or at le<strong>as</strong>t forged ahead rapidly, reaching Huberits<br />
suburb, Monty. A short distance mont at twilight. Because the armored<br />
north of the Bois des Valets the trail- infantry had not kept pace with the<br />
for it w<strong>as</strong> little more-ran between two tanks and, for all the Americans knew,<br />
wood lots. While p<strong>as</strong>sing between the another counterattack might be brewtwo<br />
woods the leading platoon of Sher- ing, CCA retired and set up its lines<br />
mans bogged down. Just such a lapse around Rechrival and Brul.<br />
w<strong>as</strong> what the German bazooka men had That night the VIII Corps commander<br />
been waiting for-they wiped out the visited the 11 th Armored command post<br />
platoon. CCB withdrew into a semicir- at Morhet and ordered the division to<br />
cle following the edge of the Bois des consolidate its positions on the following<br />
Valets, and t<strong>here</strong> the armored infantry, day before it w<strong>as</strong> relieved by the 17th<br />
with no cover overhead, sweated out the Airborne Division. This word w<strong>as</strong> renight<br />
while the German shells burst in layed to the combat commands, but
THE THIRD ARMY OFFENSIVE 647<br />
Colonel Yale, whose CCB w<strong>as</strong> only a<br />
mile or so from its original objective,<br />
Mande-St. Etienne, <strong>as</strong>ked for and w<strong>as</strong><br />
given permission to take that town on<br />
2 January. Ample artillery w<strong>as</strong> wired in<br />
to support the attack—twelve battalions<br />
fired 3,800 rounds on 120 targets<br />
in and around Monty and Mande-St. Etienne.<br />
For some re<strong>as</strong>on the attack started<br />
in midafternoon, probably too late to<br />
have made a quick and thorough<br />
purge of the German defenders. Both<br />
infantry and armored t<strong>as</strong>k forces got<br />
into the town but were forced to fight<br />
street to street and cellar to cellar all<br />
through the night before securing full<br />
possession.<br />
When the 17th Airborne moved in on<br />
3 January to take over from the 11 th Armored<br />
Division, the 11th could look<br />
back at a bitterly contested advance of<br />
six miles in four days. The human cost<br />
had been 220 killed and missing and<br />
441 wounded; the cost in materiel, 42<br />
medium and 12 light tanks.<br />
The failure of the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
to close the gap opened by Patton’s<br />
troops at B<strong>as</strong>togne convinced General<br />
Manteuffel that the time had arrived<br />
for the German forces in the Ardennes<br />
to relinquish all thought of continuing<br />
the offensive. Withdrawal in the west<br />
and south to a shortened line w<strong>as</strong> more<br />
in keeping with the true combat capa-<br />
bility of the gravely weakened divisions.<br />
At the end of the year Manteuffel had<br />
advised pulling back to the line Od-<br />
eigne–La Roche–St. Hubert. 23 By 2 Jan-<br />
23 The immediate re<strong>as</strong>on for pulling back from<br />
the exposed tip of the salient w<strong>as</strong> the American<br />
pressure on Rochefort. The 329th Infantry forced<br />
an entry t<strong>here</strong> on 29 December and, although<br />
the regiment failed to gain complete control of the<br />
uary the VIII Corps’ capture of Mande-<br />
St. Etienne so endangered the three<br />
weak divisions in the Rochefort sector<br />
at the tip of the salient that the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> commander went to Model<br />
with a plea for a general withdrawal<br />
by the two panzer armies to the line<br />
Vielsalm-Houffalize-Noville. This pes-<br />
simistic but realistic view of the German<br />
situation w<strong>as</strong> supported by Luettwitz,<br />
commanding in the west, who had<br />
expected <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> 28 December that<br />
the British would mount an attack in the<br />
Rochefort area. His suspicions were con-<br />
firmed on New Year’s Day by the<br />
identification of the British 50th In-<br />
fantry Division in the Allied line.<br />
Model apparently gave tacit profes-<br />
sional agreement to Manteuffel’s views.<br />
But he w<strong>as</strong>, quite literally, the prison-<br />
er of Hitler and the Nazi machine–it<br />
may be said that Model’s life depend-<br />
ed on continuing the fiction that the<br />
Wehrmacht would give no ground. So<br />
the staff at <strong>Army</strong> Group B continued to<br />
pore over maps and march tables for<br />
still another attack on 4 January to<br />
“er<strong>as</strong>e” B<strong>as</strong>togne. One may wonder what<br />
were the private thoughts of the old<br />
soldier Rundstedt <strong>as</strong> he watched the<br />
Allied divisions coming into array on<br />
the OB WEST situation map, readying<br />
for the kill. Whatever these thoughts,<br />
they remained his own for he no longer<br />
had the power or the prestige to influ-<br />
ence Hitler or the course of the Ar-<br />
dennes battle. The l<strong>as</strong>t entry for the year<br />
1944 in the OB WEST War Diary<br />
simply expresses the hope that the Ger-<br />
man initiative now lost in the Ardennes<br />
may be regained in the new offensive<br />
being unle<strong>as</strong>hed that very moment<br />
town on this date, the enemy could not risk<br />
a further defense with his depleted forces.
648 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE'<br />
against the American and French forces<br />
in Alsace. This new battle, however,<br />
would have little effect on the German<br />
forces which, on 3 January, faced the<br />
great Allied counteroffensive <strong>as</strong> it moved<br />
into high gear to flatten the Bulge<br />
and steamroller a path to and over the<br />
Rhine.
The Weather<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is an axiom that weather on<br />
the battlefield is divided equally be-<br />
tween the combatants—but its impact on<br />
military operations is not equal in<br />
amount or direction. The German selec-<br />
tion of a target date for the commence-<br />
ment of the Ardennes offensive turned<br />
on the prediction of poor flying weather.<br />
This type of weather had a useful side<br />
effect during the rupture of the Amer-<br />
ican lines since it veiled the attacker<br />
with fog and mist, a very important fea-<br />
ture of the initial German successes<br />
just <strong>as</strong> it had been in the great offensives<br />
of 1918. The high pressure system which<br />
came in from the Atlantic on 18 De-<br />
cember, however, worked momentarily<br />
against the attacker. A thaw set in which<br />
slowed his tanks and the erstwhile heavy<br />
ground fog began to show sudden<br />
openings, such <strong>as</strong> those which exposed<br />
the German tanks and infantry during<br />
the fight at Noville. On the 20th and<br />
21st the higher ground began to freeze<br />
in patches, leaving stretches of the Ar-<br />
dennes roads slippery and muddy. By<br />
the 22d competing weather systems from<br />
Russia and the Atlantic had brought on<br />
a hodgepodge of snow, blizzards, fog,<br />
and rain. In the north the Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> bogged by rain and mud, in<br />
the south the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
hampered in its swing around B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
CHAPTER XXV<br />
Epilogue<br />
togne by fog and snow, and along the<br />
German supply roads back over the Eifel<br />
snow fell continuously.<br />
The dramatic change of the 23d,<br />
brought by cold, dry winds from the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t, stripped the German armies of<br />
their immunity to air attack. But this<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not the whole story. Snow began<br />
to drift in the Eifel hills, bringing traf-<br />
fic on the main supply roads west of the<br />
Rhine almost to a standstill. Horse-<br />
drawn snowplows were few and ineffec-<br />
tive, h<strong>as</strong>tily erected snow fences were<br />
torn down by troops scrounging for<br />
firewood, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no gravel available,<br />
and a large number of the engineer<br />
construction battalions had been taken<br />
west for employment <strong>as</strong> infantry. By<br />
the time power snowplows reached the<br />
Eifel the American fighter-bombers were<br />
strafing and bombing every large vehicle<br />
that moved. Engineers were brought<br />
into the Eifel, but their very efforts de-<br />
layed the German truck columns so<br />
urgently needed farther west. 1<br />
For five days the weather favored the<br />
Americans, in the air and on the ground.<br />
Superior numerically in tanks, the<br />
Americans benefited more than the Ger-<br />
mans from the sure footing the big<br />
freeze provided for armor. Then, on 28<br />
1 See description in MS # B–172, <strong>Army</strong> Group B<br />
Engineers, 1–25 January 1945 (Generalleutnant<br />
Richard Wirtz) .
650 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
December, came clouds and overc<strong>as</strong>t<br />
followed, a day later, by arctic air from<br />
Scandinavia, heavy snows, blizzards, and<br />
greatly reduced visibility at ground<br />
level. Vehicular movement w<strong>as</strong> slow, the<br />
riflemen exhausted themselves wading<br />
through the drifts, and the wounded-<br />
those in a state of shock–died if left<br />
in the snow for half an hour or more.<br />
This w<strong>as</strong> the state of the weather when,<br />
on 3 January, the Allies began their<br />
final counterattack.<br />
The Opposing Troop Strengths<br />
On the morning of 16 December the<br />
American forces in the path of the Ger-<br />
man counteroffensive comprised four<br />
and two-thirds divisions with an effec-<br />
tive strength of about 83,000 men. The<br />
heavy weapons then available numbered<br />
242 Sherman tanks, 182 tank destroyers,<br />
and 394 pieces of corps and divisional<br />
artillery. These troops and weapons<br />
were deployed on a meandering front of<br />
104 miles.<br />
The enemy <strong>as</strong>sault divisions posed to<br />
the e<strong>as</strong>t had concentrated behind some<br />
ninety miles of the front manned by<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group B, and during the night<br />
of 15 December over 200,000 combat<br />
troops gat<strong>here</strong>d in the forward <strong>as</strong>sembly<br />
area, about three miles in depth. The<br />
German attack, <strong>as</strong> it developed during<br />
the course of 16 December, w<strong>as</strong> made<br />
on an <strong>as</strong>sault front of sixty miles and<br />
included 5 armored divisions, 12 2/3 in-<br />
fantry divisions, and about 500 medium<br />
tanks, the whole supported by the fire of<br />
1,900 guns and Werfers.<br />
Although it is impossible to me<strong>as</strong>ure<br />
the exact number of rifle battalions and<br />
tank battalions committed by the Ger-<br />
mans during the initial breakthrough<br />
attack, it is probable that the over-all<br />
ratio of German infantry to American<br />
w<strong>as</strong> three to one, with a ratio of six<br />
to one at points of concentration. Ger-<br />
man armored superiority w<strong>as</strong> some-<br />
what less pronounced during the first-<br />
day <strong>as</strong>sault, only about two to one in<br />
medium tanks. If the self-propelled guns<br />
employed in a tank role are considered,<br />
the superiority enjoyed by the attacker<br />
w<strong>as</strong> about four to one.<br />
By 2 January 1945, the eve of the<br />
Allied attack to destroy the Ardennes<br />
salient, the Germans had thrown 8 ar-<br />
mored divisions, 20 infantry divisions,<br />
and 2 mechanized brigades into the Bat-<br />
tle of the Bulge. During these eighteen<br />
days the Americans had employed 8 ar-<br />
mored, 16 infantry, and 2 airborne divi-<br />
sions in the line. 2 This tabulation of<br />
the opposing divisions, however, does not<br />
give a true me<strong>as</strong>ure of the relative com-<br />
bat strength deployed in what may be<br />
called the German ph<strong>as</strong>e of the winter<br />
battle in the Ardennes.<br />
The American rifle division in 1944<br />
w<strong>as</strong> organized at a strength of 14,032<br />
men, and most of the divisions engaged<br />
in this operation entered the fray<br />
at full complement. The personnel<br />
strength of the German infantry divi-<br />
sions varied, at the time of their com-<br />
2 The German order of battle for the period of<br />
16 December–2 January w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong> follows: 1st SS, 2d<br />
SS, 9th SS, 12th SS Panzer Divisions; Panzer Lehr<br />
and 2d, 9th, 116th Panzer Divisions; 3d and 5th<br />
Parachute Divisions; 3d and 15th Panzer Grenadier<br />
Divisions; 9th, 12th, 18th, 26th, 62d, 79th, 167th,<br />
212th, 246th, 272d, 276th, 277th, 326th, 340th, 352d,<br />
560th Volks Grenadier Divisions; and the Fuehrer-<br />
Grenadier and Fuehrer Begleit Brigades. The<br />
American order of battle for the same period in-<br />
cluded: the 2d, 3d, 4th, 6th, 7th, 9th, 10th, and<br />
11th Armored Divisions; the 82d and 101st Air-<br />
borne Divisions; the 1st, 2d, 4th, 5th, 9th, 26th,<br />
28th, 3oth, 35th, 75th, 80th, 83d, 84th, 87th, 99th,<br />
and 106th Infantry Divisions.
EPILOGUE 651<br />
mitment, between 8,000 and 17,000, the<br />
lower figure representing those divisions<br />
which had been refitted at 80 percent<br />
of the 1944 Volks Grenadier division<br />
table of organization and equipment<br />
and the upper figure, which can be ap-<br />
plied to only three or four divisions, rep-<br />
resenting those, like the 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division, which retained the<br />
older, regular infantry division com-<br />
position. The strength of the Ger-<br />
man infantry divisions across the<br />
board probably averaged little more<br />
than 10,000 men. The normal German<br />
rifle regiment numbered 1,868 <strong>as</strong> con-<br />
tr<strong>as</strong>ted with the American infantry reg-<br />
iment of 3,207 officers and men.<br />
The majority of the German panzer<br />
divisions had the same manpower con-<br />
figuration <strong>as</strong> the two U.S. square ar-<br />
mored divisions (the 2d and 3d), that is,<br />
a little over 14,000. The six remaining<br />
U.S. armored divisions had the new tri-<br />
angular organization with a roster re-<br />
duced to 10,666 officers and men. The<br />
armored weight of the opposing divi-<br />
sions, however, strongly favored the<br />
Americans, for the German panzer divi-<br />
sion brought an average of go to 100<br />
medium tanks into the field w<strong>here</strong><strong>as</strong><br />
the American triangular division w<strong>as</strong><br />
equipped with 186 and the two square<br />
divisions had 232 medium tanks in their<br />
organization tables. Hitler personally<br />
attempted to compensate for this dis-<br />
parity by ordering the attachment of<br />
separate <strong>Army</strong> tank battalions of 40 to<br />
50 Panthers or Tigers to the regular pan-<br />
zer divisions.<br />
The battle area during the period of<br />
16 December through 3 January h<strong>as</strong> to<br />
be me<strong>as</strong>ured <strong>as</strong> a salient in which the<br />
relation between the width of the b<strong>as</strong>e<br />
and the depth of the penetration rep-<br />
resents a me<strong>as</strong>ure of the adequacy of<br />
the forces employed and their operation-<br />
al mobility. The German failure to<br />
break through on the north shoulder at<br />
Monschau had considerable impact on<br />
the width of the planned <strong>as</strong>sault front,<br />
and by 18 December the b<strong>as</strong>e of the<br />
salient had stabilized at a width of forty-<br />
seven air-line miles, narrower than de-<br />
sired. The greatest depth of the Ger-<br />
man penetration, achieved on the tenth<br />
day of the attack, w<strong>as</strong> about sixty air-<br />
line miles. On that date, however, the<br />
average width of the salient had been<br />
reduced to thirty miles and at its tip<br />
me<strong>as</strong>ured no more than a five-mile front<br />
facing the Meuse. Indeed, the width of<br />
the <strong>as</strong>sault front proper can be consid-<br />
ered <strong>as</strong> the range of the 75-mm. guns<br />
on the 2d Panzer tanks. By this time<br />
the Americans had something approach-<br />
ing a co-ordinated and homogeneous line<br />
<strong>as</strong> a retaining wall north and south of<br />
the salient, with a frontage of nearly<br />
seven miles per division on the north<br />
flank and a little more than thirteen<br />
miles on the southern flank.<br />
The Opposing Weapons<br />
Although winter in the Ardennes<br />
placed severe limitations on the use of<br />
armor, the tank w<strong>as</strong> a major weapon in<br />
the hands of both antagonists. The Sher-<br />
man tank, a medium of the thirty-ton<br />
cl<strong>as</strong>s, bore the brunt of all American ar-<br />
mored action, while the light tank w<strong>as</strong><br />
relegated to minor tactical t<strong>as</strong>ks. The<br />
Sherman (M4) w<strong>as</strong> battle tested, and<br />
most of the mechanical bugs had been<br />
removed. Its major weaknesses—tank<br />
gun and armor—by this time were well<br />
appreciated by the user. A new model,<br />
the M4A3, had been equipped with a
652 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
high-velocity, long-barreled 76-mm. gun<br />
to replace the old, short-barreled 75-<br />
mm., but not many of these were in the<br />
European Theater of Operations. Also,<br />
a very few Shermans had been modified<br />
to carry a heavier weight of armor plate<br />
-the so-called Jumbo tanks. The Jum-<br />
bos, which had been tried out during<br />
the autumn fighting, proved so success-<br />
ful that General Patton ordered their<br />
use <strong>as</strong> lead tanks in the drive to B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne—but most American tankers<br />
never saw the Jumbo in December 1944.<br />
The Germans had a family of three<br />
main battle tanks. The Mark IV, which<br />
received its first real combat test in<br />
May 1940, weighed twenty-seven tons,<br />
had somewhat less armor than the Sher-<br />
man, about the same maximum road<br />
speed, and a tank gun comparable in<br />
weight of projectile and muzzle veloc-<br />
ity to the 76-mm. American tank gun<br />
but superior to the short-barreled 75-<br />
mm.<br />
The Panther, Mark V, had proved it-<br />
self during 1944 but still w<strong>as</strong> subject to<br />
mechanical failures which were well rec-<br />
ognized but which seemingly could not<br />
be corrected in the h<strong>as</strong>ty German pro-<br />
duction schedules. This tank had a<br />
weight of fifty tons, a superiority in b<strong>as</strong>e<br />
armor of one-half to one inch over<br />
the Sherman, good mobility and flota-<br />
tion, greater speed, and a high-velocity<br />
gun superior even to the new American<br />
76-mm. tank gun.<br />
The Tiger, Mark VI, had been de-<br />
veloped <strong>as</strong> an answer to the heavy Rus-<br />
sian tank but had encountered numerous<br />
production difficulties (it had over 26,-<br />
000 parts) and never reached the field<br />
in the numbers Hitler desired. The<br />
original model weighed fifty-four tons,<br />
had thicker armor than the Panther, in-<br />
cluding heavy top armor <strong>as</strong> protection<br />
against air attack, w<strong>as</strong> capable of a speed<br />
comparable to the Sherman, and mount-<br />
ed a high-velocity 88-mm. cannon. A still<br />
heavier Mark VI, the King Tiger, had<br />
an added two to four inches of armor<br />
plate. Few of this model ever reached<br />
the Ardennes, although it w<strong>as</strong> com-<br />
monly reported by American troops.<br />
Exact figures on German tank<br />
strength are not available, but it would<br />
appear that of the estimated 1,800 pan-<br />
zers in the Ardennes battle some 250<br />
were Tigers and the balance w<strong>as</strong> divid-<br />
ed equally between the Mark IV and the<br />
Panther. Battle experience in France,<br />
which w<strong>as</strong> confirmed in the Ardennes,<br />
gave the Sherman the edge over the<br />
Mark IV in frontal, flank, and rear<br />
attack. The Panther often had been<br />
beaten by the Sherman during the cam-<br />
paign in France, and would be defeated<br />
on the Ardennes battleground, but<br />
in nearly all c<strong>as</strong>es of a forthright tank<br />
engagement the Panther lost only when<br />
American numerical superiority permit-<br />
ted an M4 to get a shot at flank or tail.<br />
Insofar <strong>as</strong> the Tiger w<strong>as</strong> concerned,<br />
the Sherman had to get off a lucky<br />
round or the result would be strictly no<br />
contest.<br />
American and German divisional<br />
artillery w<strong>as</strong> very similar, having fol-<br />
lowed the same developmental pattern<br />
during the 1930’s. Differences in corps<br />
artillery were slight, although the Ger-<br />
mans placed more emph<strong>as</strong>is on long-<br />
range guns in the heavy calibers,<br />
170-mm. and above. The German <strong>Army</strong>,<br />
<strong>as</strong> the result of its battles on the E<strong>as</strong>tern<br />
Front and experiences with the Soviet<br />
rocket artillery, placed great faith in the<br />
Werfer, a multiple-tube rocket launcher.<br />
This weapon w<strong>as</strong> e<strong>as</strong>y to produce and
EPILOGUE 653<br />
could be e<strong>as</strong>ily transported, a major<br />
design feature when the production<br />
of heavy trucks and artillery prime<br />
movers began to fall off in the Reich.<br />
The 150-mm. version weighed only 1,200<br />
pounds and could fire a quarter-ton<br />
of high explosives in ten seconds; the<br />
210-mm. model weighed about a ton<br />
and a half and could discharge over<br />
half a ton of high explosives per salvo.<br />
These weapons lacked the accuracy and<br />
fire control features of conventional ar-<br />
tillery, and because of the bl<strong>as</strong>t could<br />
be readily spotted, but their mobility<br />
seems to have been a major feature in<br />
carrying German firepower forward<br />
during the Ardennes offensive.<br />
American and German doctrine and<br />
organization for the employment of in-<br />
fantry-support weapons had followed<br />
different paths during the development<br />
cycle between the two World Wars when<br />
the problem of the “infantry-accom-<br />
panying gun” had plagued all armies.<br />
The German <strong>Army</strong> ultimately opted<br />
for a self-propelled 75-mm. <strong>as</strong>sault gun<br />
designed to help the infantry platoon<br />
forward in the <strong>as</strong>sault and, at the same<br />
time, to provide a real antitank capa-<br />
bility. The concept and the weapon had<br />
proved themselves on the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front,<br />
but the battle w<strong>as</strong>tage of this weapon,<br />
like that of the <strong>as</strong>sault infantry it sup-<br />
ported, w<strong>as</strong> extraordinarily high. In<br />
December 1944, the German infantry<br />
used a battle drill and tactics “leaning”<br />
on an accompanying weapon which no<br />
longer could be issued in proper num-<br />
bers to even the most favored divisions.<br />
German battle commanders invariably<br />
point to the lack of this weapon in ex-<br />
plaining particular failures of their in-<br />
fantry in battle.<br />
The American approach to this prob-<br />
lem reflected the opposition of the<br />
U.S. <strong>Army</strong> to dual-purpose weapons,<br />
and <strong>as</strong> a result the U.S. rifle ,regiment<br />
carried both a cannon company and<br />
an antitank company. On the whole<br />
neither of these units performed<br />
<strong>as</strong> desired during the Ardennes<br />
battle. The howitzers of the cannon<br />
company seemed to fire effectively only<br />
when tied with the divisional artillery,<br />
the 57-mm. antitank gun lacked the<br />
punch to meet German tanks, and,<br />
what w<strong>as</strong> worse, most division com-<br />
manders looked upon these weapons<br />
companies <strong>as</strong> providing additional rifle-<br />
men to put into the foxhole line. So it<br />
w<strong>as</strong> on the thinly held American front<br />
of 16 December.<br />
The American self-propelled 90-mm.<br />
tank destroyer and the 88-mm. German<br />
equivalent were much feared, or at the<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t highly respected, for they had the<br />
power to penetrate the armor they<br />
faced, they could jockey for position<br />
along the winding Ardennes roads and<br />
defiles, and they were hard to<br />
destroy. Both antagonists used 75-mm.<br />
towed antitank weapons and both<br />
lost these towed weapons and other<br />
towed artillery in large numbers. In<br />
the mud and snow, and under direct fire<br />
and infantry <strong>as</strong>sault, the t<strong>as</strong>k of limber-<br />
ing gun to truck or tractor w<strong>as</strong><br />
difficult and hazardous. Furthermore,<br />
in heavy and close combat the tow<br />
vehicle often w<strong>as</strong> shot up or immobilized<br />
while the gun, dug in, remained<br />
intact. The mobile, tactically agile,<br />
self-propelled, armored field artil-<br />
lery and tank destroyers are clearly<br />
traceable in the Ardennes fighting <strong>as</strong><br />
over and over again influencing the<br />
course of battle. Their record should<br />
be pondered in the design of tactics
654 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
and missiles.<br />
The difficult terrain on which the win-<br />
ter campaign w<strong>as</strong> fought, the prevalence<br />
of pitched battles at night and in fog,<br />
the tactical failure of the American 57-<br />
mm. antitank gun, and the paucity of<br />
German <strong>as</strong>sault guns and self-propelled<br />
tank destroyers brought the bazooka in-<br />
to a place of prominence on both sides<br />
of the line. Admittedly the bazooka w<strong>as</strong><br />
a suicide weapon, but t<strong>here</strong> were always<br />
brave men—mostly platoon and squad<br />
leaders—to risk its use against an enemy<br />
tank. In the autumn of 1944 the Ger-<br />
man <strong>Army</strong> recognized that it w<strong>as</strong> too<br />
late for building tank destroyers in the<br />
numbers required and that in any c<strong>as</strong>e<br />
fuel w<strong>as</strong> lacking for their transport in-<br />
to battle. T<strong>here</strong>fore the decision w<strong>as</strong><br />
made to build hand rocket weapons and<br />
rely on the courage of the “single<br />
fighter”-a decision like that made in<br />
1917–1918 when the Kaiser’s army<br />
turned to armor-piercing rifles in the<br />
hands of the single fighter to stop Allied<br />
tanks. In December 1944 both sides<br />
learned that infantry companies armed<br />
with bazook<strong>as</strong> could not do the work of<br />
tank destroyers.<br />
The success of field artillery <strong>as</strong> an<br />
antidote to the tank is difficult to <strong>as</strong>sess<br />
quantitatively. American and German<br />
doctrine taught that long-range artil-<br />
lery could be used to break up tank<br />
concentrations before these reached the<br />
infantry zone. In the Ardennes, however,<br />
American artillery groupments not only<br />
performed this interdiction role but on<br />
numerous occ<strong>as</strong>ions stopped the tank <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault right at the rifle line. Surprisingly<br />
enough, in several of those battles w<strong>here</strong><br />
causative agents in tank kills could be<br />
determined by postmortem possession of<br />
the battle area, the high explosives fired<br />
by American field artillery accounted for<br />
a large share of the kills made, although<br />
the actual damage inflicted may have<br />
been no more than a broken track or<br />
sprocket wheel.<br />
Mortars, machine guns, and rifles<br />
functioned in a comparable manner on<br />
both sides of the line. Here the design<br />
of the infantry weapon proved less im-<br />
portant in the bloody competition of<br />
the fire fight than the supply of am-<br />
munition, the numbers employed, and<br />
the small unit tactics. The single excep-<br />
tion is the machine pistol, which had<br />
been issued in large numbers to the new<br />
Volks Grenadier divisions and w<strong>as</strong> very<br />
successfully employed by the German<br />
special <strong>as</strong>sault companies formed in each<br />
infantry regiment.<br />
Weapons and fire control turned main-<br />
ly on wire communications, laid forward<br />
to observation posts and back to com-<br />
mand posts. The vulnerability of tele-<br />
phone wire w<strong>as</strong> adequately demonstra-<br />
ted on the morning of 16 December and<br />
throughout the campaign–yet it contin-<br />
ued to be the primary means of tacti-<br />
cal communication. Radio, of the type<br />
used in late 1944, lacked the necessary<br />
range and constantly failed in the woods<br />
and defiles. Both sides engaged in jam-<br />
ming, but for the most part the really<br />
damaging interference came from<br />
friendly transmitters.<br />
Three additional items of equipment<br />
deserve attention in the history of the<br />
December battle: the V-weapon, the<br />
searchlight, and the proximity fuze. The<br />
V-weapon turned out to have no tactical<br />
significance, although the German high<br />
command stepped up the attack on the<br />
Allied depots at Antwerp and Liège dur-<br />
ing the Ardennes offensive, averaging<br />
at le<strong>as</strong>t 135 firings a week against Liège
EPILOGUE 655<br />
and 235 against Antwerp. These mostly<br />
were the pilotless aircraft or V-1 type,<br />
bearing 2,240 pounds of explosive. The<br />
military c<strong>as</strong>ualties inflicted by this V-<br />
weapons attack were slight, except for<br />
one strike on 16 December which de-<br />
stroyed an Antwerp cinema, killing 296<br />
British soldiers and wounding 194.<br />
Searchlights had been used by the<br />
Allies to illuminate the battlefield dur-<br />
ing the North African and Italian cam-<br />
paigns. However, the six battalions of<br />
tank-mounted searchlights (Canal De-<br />
fense Lights) which the Americans<br />
brought into Normandy had been re-<br />
converted in November for normal ar-<br />
mored use on the grounds that no<br />
“operational requirement” for the Ca-<br />
nal Defense Light existed. The Germans<br />
had produced a large number of search-<br />
lights for use with flak batteries in the<br />
defense of major target centers in the<br />
Reich. In early December OB WEST<br />
ran two tests of searchlights in a ground<br />
role, with and without troops. These<br />
tests showed that an accidented battle-<br />
field could be extensively illuminated<br />
in front of attacking infantry. As a re-<br />
sult some two hundred searchlights were<br />
gat<strong>here</strong>d immediately behind the <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault front and, on the morning of 16<br />
December, flicked on to guide the first<br />
waves of infantry and to point targets,<br />
by cloud reflection, during the artillery<br />
preparation. Although very successful<br />
in <strong>as</strong>sisting the <strong>as</strong>sault companies over<br />
the first one or two thousand yards, the<br />
60-cm. lights (with a ground range of<br />
little more than three thousand yards)<br />
could not keep up with the attack, and<br />
a number of German detachments, sup-<br />
posed to guide on the searchlight beams,<br />
wandered away from their objectives.<br />
Some of these smaller lights were<br />
brought forward and appeared in at-<br />
tacks <strong>as</strong> late <strong>as</strong> 18 December, but the<br />
ponderous 150- and 200-cm. lights seem<br />
to have been left behind at the original<br />
line of departure. 3<br />
The proximity fuze, a tightly guard-<br />
ed American secret design for detonat-<br />
ing projectiles by external influence in<br />
the close vicinity of a target, without ex-<br />
plosion by contact, got its first battle test<br />
in a ground role during the Ardennes.<br />
This fuze, also known <strong>as</strong> the VT or<br />
POZIT fuze, had been prepared for<br />
some 210 rounds of artillery am-<br />
munition on the Continent in December.<br />
Most of this stock w<strong>as</strong> antiaircraft artil-<br />
lery ammunition, and the 12th <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group had proposed to try it out in<br />
the so-called Liège River Belt, the cor-<br />
don of antiaircraft gun battalions which<br />
w<strong>as</strong> organized to shoot down the V-<br />
weapons in flight to Liège. On 16 De-<br />
cember a few field artillery battalions<br />
in the First <strong>Army</strong> had small stocks of<br />
the new ammunition, a few had wit-<br />
nessed demonstrations, and a very few<br />
had fired it. Two battalions in the VIII<br />
Corps artillery had been issued some<br />
rounds of VT ammunition, but so far<br />
<strong>as</strong> can be determined none were fired<br />
on the first day of the German attack.<br />
Actually this highly secret ammunition<br />
w<strong>as</strong> employed on only a few occ<strong>as</strong>ions<br />
prior to the Allied counterattack in<br />
early January, and then usually at night<br />
or in poor weather when the American<br />
gunners could not get sensing for nor-<br />
mal time fire missions. The postwar<br />
claims <strong>as</strong> to the value of the much tout-<br />
3 For the characteristics of this equipment, see<br />
H. A. Koch, Flak: Die Geschichte der Deutschen<br />
Flakartillerie (Bad Nauheim, Germany: Podzuhn-<br />
Verlag, 1954).
656 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
ed VT fuze in halting the German ad-<br />
vance are grossly exaggerated. 4<br />
American records on the causes of<br />
combat wounds and deaths are woefully<br />
inadequate and German records for<br />
this period do not exist. In the Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong> it is reckoned-in a very broad<br />
manner-that during the period 1 Au-<br />
gust–31 November 1944 the causative<br />
agent for between 27 and 30 percent<br />
of the total wounded admitted to <strong>Army</strong><br />
hospitals w<strong>as</strong> the gunshot wound,<br />
while high explosive agents (artillery<br />
shell, mortar shell, bombs, mines, and<br />
the like) accounted for between 50 and<br />
60 percent of the monthly rosters of<br />
wounded. During December these two<br />
causative agents respectively accounted<br />
for 25 percent and 60 percent of the<br />
wounded. T<strong>here</strong> is no accurate account-<br />
ing for the causative agent in the c<strong>as</strong>e<br />
of men killed in action.<br />
The Artillery Arm in the<br />
A rdennes<br />
The dramatic and successful offensive<br />
operations of the German <strong>Army</strong> in the<br />
early years of World War II had fea-<br />
tured the extensive employment of <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault aircraft to punch the holes through<br />
which the panzers poured. At the close<br />
of 1944 the Third Reich lacked the<br />
planes which once had provided the air-<br />
borne “artillery” of blitzkrieg. So Hit-<br />
ler, the infantryman of World War I,<br />
4 As an example see Vannevar Bush, Modern<br />
Arms and Free Men (New York: Simon and<br />
Schuster, 1949) : “The proximity fuze may well<br />
have saved Liège,” p. 31. The conclusions reached<br />
in the text above are b<strong>as</strong>ed on the rigorous<br />
analysis in Royce L. Thompson’s Employment of<br />
VT Fuzes in the Ardennes Campaign (1950). MS<br />
in OCMH files.<br />
turned to the time-tested tactic he knew,<br />
m<strong>as</strong>sive artillery preparation for the<br />
ground <strong>as</strong>sault. In many ways the Ger-<br />
man use of the artillery arm on 16 De-<br />
cember w<strong>as</strong> a carbon copy of the artil-<br />
lery preparations for the great offensives<br />
in 1918. But t<strong>here</strong> were some major<br />
differences. Intense counterbattery fire,<br />
a necessary feature of the artillery prep-<br />
arations in 1918, no longer w<strong>as</strong> possible;<br />
Germany lacked the huge ammunition<br />
stocks required. Captive balloons and<br />
observation planes had directed the<br />
movement of artillery fire in 1918. These<br />
auxiliaries were missing in the Ar-<br />
dennes, and ground observation t<strong>here</strong><br />
normally favored the Americans. Luden-<br />
dorff had been able to m<strong>as</strong>s ninety heavy<br />
caliber guns per kilometer for the<br />
March offensive. Model would have<br />
fewer than twenty tubes for each kilo-<br />
meter of the <strong>as</strong>sault front.<br />
Hitler, looking back to 1918, had<br />
demanded a m<strong>as</strong>sive artillery prepara-<br />
tion l<strong>as</strong>ting for two or three hours, and<br />
this in full daylight. Probably at Man-<br />
teuffel’s instigation, he finally agreed<br />
that a short, sharp, predawn artillery<br />
preparation-of the sort conventionally<br />
practiced on the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front-would<br />
be used in the Ardennes. T<strong>here</strong> seems<br />
to have been no gigantic, homogeneous<br />
artillery fire plan on 16 December, <strong>as</strong><br />
had been the practice in 1918. In the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> a go-minute prepara-<br />
tion w<strong>as</strong> fired on villages and deep <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sembly positions to the rear of the Amer-<br />
ican line, and followed by unobserved<br />
area fire along the main line of resist-<br />
ance. The guns and Werfers in the<br />
Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> fired forty rounds<br />
per tube in the first twenty minutes<br />
against predesignated targets, then com-<br />
menced a rolling barrage, the old World
EPILOGUE 657<br />
War I Feuerwalze, with sixty rounds at<br />
each piece.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> were deviations from this pattern<br />
in -accordance with the ground and<br />
estimated American strength. The<br />
26th Volks Grenadier Division, for example,<br />
advanced behind a preparation<br />
fired by three hundred tubes which, for<br />
seventeen minutes, worked over targets<br />
illuminated by searchlights. The Seventh<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, which had a relatively small<br />
number of artillery and Werfer battalions,<br />
w<strong>as</strong> forced to concentrate its fire on<br />
a few selected target are<strong>as</strong>. The most intensive<br />
preparation fired <strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
support of the two <strong>as</strong>sault regiments of<br />
the 5th Parachute Division: to smooth<br />
its advance seventy-two guns fired ninety<br />
rounds each <strong>as</strong> f<strong>as</strong>t <strong>as</strong> the cannoneers<br />
could work their pieces. All three of<br />
the armies relied upon the speed and<br />
shock of the initial <strong>as</strong>sault to overrun<br />
any deep American artillery groupments<br />
which might be in position to menace<br />
the infantry and armored advance.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is no doubt that the German<br />
artillery helped the <strong>as</strong>sault waves forward<br />
during the rupture of the American<br />
forward defensive positions. It is<br />
equally clear that the German artillery<br />
failed to keep pace with the subsequent<br />
advance, nor did it come forward rapidly<br />
enough to <strong>as</strong>sist substantially in the<br />
reduction of those American points of<br />
resistance which had been left in the<br />
rear of attacking echelons. The relative<br />
immobility of corps and army artillery<br />
may be <strong>as</strong>cribed to bad roads, the lack<br />
of heavy, fully tracked artillery prime<br />
movers, and traffic congestion. The road<br />
jam at the Our bridges delayed the forward<br />
displacement of the LVIII Panzer<br />
Corps artillery until 19 December, and<br />
then only a few batteries crossed the<br />
river. The switch southward of the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>’s main effort on 17<br />
December blocked the roads on which<br />
Manteuffel w<strong>as</strong> moving the Fifth Panzer<br />
artillery. The artillery corps attached<br />
to the II SS Panzer Corps took five days<br />
to reach firing positions e<strong>as</strong>t of Butgen-<br />
bach, just to the rear of the original<br />
American line.<br />
All these delays had a mirror-image<br />
in the transport of ammunition. This<br />
resulted in an early decision by the<br />
artillery officers of the three armies to<br />
leave about half of the guns and Wer-<br />
fers behind. Werfer battalions and bri-<br />
gades were not moved up to share in the<br />
battle until the end of December, and<br />
only a few reached the front lines. In<br />
the main the German <strong>as</strong>sault infantry<br />
were forced to rely on the fire support<br />
given by tanks and <strong>as</strong>sault guns, rather<br />
than m<strong>as</strong>sed artillery fire. T<strong>here</strong> were<br />
exceptions, however, and by dint of<br />
great effort the Germans occ<strong>as</strong>ionally<br />
were able to create artillery groupments<br />
which, following the practice learned<br />
on the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front, became artillery<br />
“centers of gravity.” This w<strong>as</strong> done by<br />
the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> commander in an<br />
attempt to get his flank moving on 19<br />
and 20 December, and a similar group-<br />
ment w<strong>as</strong> prepared by Model and Man-<br />
teuffel to pave the way for the B<strong>as</strong>togne<br />
counterattacks at the close of Decem-<br />
ber.<br />
Throughout the exploitation and sta-<br />
bilization ph<strong>as</strong>e of the German offensive<br />
the Americans enjoyed an immense su-<br />
periority in the artillery arm. This w<strong>as</strong><br />
not true, however, during the first hours<br />
of the German attack to rupture the<br />
American defenses. On 16 December the<br />
VIII Corps artillery w<strong>as</strong> caught off bal-<br />
ance, since eight of its nine battalions
658 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
were positioned to support the untried<br />
106th Division. The 99th Division, on<br />
the north flank, had only one battalion<br />
of corps artillery in support. And the<br />
records show only 2,500 rounds shot by<br />
American corps artillery in planned de-<br />
fensive and counterpreparation fires on<br />
the first day of the battle.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> are a number of re<strong>as</strong>ons for<br />
the American failure to apply the full<br />
weight of the artillery arm on 16 De-<br />
cember. The initial enemy shellfire did<br />
severe damage to the U.S. artillery com-<br />
munications net. Even after repairs were<br />
made, intelligence <strong>as</strong> to the German lo-<br />
cations and intentions moved very slowly<br />
from command post to command post<br />
(the 559th Field Artillery Battalion, for<br />
example, received no warning of the<br />
German force to its front until 1215).<br />
The firing battalions supporting the<br />
106th Division were hampered by “no-<br />
fire” lines earlier established by the<br />
division, and t<strong>here</strong> seems to have been<br />
little or no attempt to lift these restric-<br />
tions <strong>as</strong> the enemy <strong>as</strong>sault waves swept<br />
forward to grapple the American infan-<br />
try. Corps artillery proved quite <strong>as</strong> vul-<br />
nerable to a f<strong>as</strong>t-moving ground attack<br />
<strong>as</strong> the divisional gunners, and <strong>as</strong> early<br />
<strong>as</strong> 1035 the VIII Corps artillery w<strong>as</strong> dis-<br />
placing rearward on orders. The towed<br />
battalions, particularly the 155-mm. and<br />
8-in. artillery, took long to limber and<br />
even longer to find a place on the<br />
crowded roads leading west; it is not<br />
surprising that they fell prey quite <strong>as</strong><br />
often to German infantry <strong>as</strong> to panzers.<br />
A large portion of the VIII Corps artil-<br />
lery w<strong>as</strong> forced to displace so often that<br />
two to four days would elapse before the<br />
battalions finally settled long enough to<br />
engage the enemy. Other battalions sim-<br />
ply were whittled away by enemy action<br />
every time they went into firing position<br />
(the 687th Field Artillery Battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
overrun in front of Wiltz, in Wiltz, and<br />
west of Wiltz). Observation w<strong>as</strong> very<br />
poor until midafternoon on the 16th, no<br />
artillery planes got up, and unobserved<br />
fire on the German West Wall positions<br />
pounded <strong>as</strong>sembly are<strong>as</strong> long since left<br />
behind by the enemy moving west.<br />
The artillery fire fight on the first<br />
day of the attack and for most of the<br />
second w<strong>as</strong> carried by the divisional<br />
howitzer battalions, which began to en-<br />
gage observed targets two and a half to<br />
three hours after the start of the Ger-<br />
man preparation. Many of these battal-<br />
ions were firing with only one eye, since<br />
wire to a number of observations posts<br />
went out by 0630, others were systema-<br />
tically engulfed during the morning by<br />
the German <strong>as</strong>sault companies, all mi-<br />
crophones for sound-ranging were out of<br />
operation by the evening of the 16th,<br />
and several of those batteries which<br />
were firing lost their ammunition trucks<br />
in the melee along the roads to the<br />
rear. Many of the forward batteries<br />
were put out of action <strong>as</strong> soon <strong>as</strong> the<br />
infantry line to their front broke; others<br />
fired until the evening of the 17th and<br />
still were able to withdraw successfully.<br />
Did the American gunners blunt or<br />
delay the first German thrust? At Mon-<br />
schau the artillery stopped the attack<br />
cold, effectively narrowing the German<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault front. In the 99th Division sec-<br />
tor the division artillery held its ground<br />
until the close of the 17th when the V<br />
Corps artillery groupment at Elsenborn<br />
took over the fight with such a weight<br />
of metal that one infantry battalion w<strong>as</strong><br />
covered by a defensive barrage of 11,500<br />
rounds during the night of 17 December.<br />
The Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>, on the con-
EPILOGUE<br />
trary, w<strong>as</strong> little impeded by the scant<br />
collection of American artillery to its<br />
front. On the German left wing the<br />
Seventh <strong>Army</strong> advance w<strong>as</strong> damaged<br />
considerably by the American howitzers,<br />
for the batteries <strong>here</strong> retained their<br />
link to the observation posts on the<br />
heights overlooking the Sure River and<br />
succeeded in delaying the German<br />
bridging efforts for many hours.<br />
As the American defense solidified<br />
along the shoulders of the salient or at<br />
strong points, such <strong>as</strong> St. Vith and<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne, the artillery arm really com-<br />
menced to make its weight felt. Experi-<br />
enced German artillery officers estimate<br />
that their American opponents finally<br />
had a superiority in guns and ammu-<br />
nition of ten to one. This estimate is<br />
far too high: the Americans fired about<br />
1,255,000 artillery rounds during the<br />
fighting covered in this account and by<br />
23 December had brought a total of<br />
4,155 artillery pieces into action. Just <strong>as</strong><br />
in 1918, however, the attacker had<br />
driven the defense back upon its artil-<br />
lery b<strong>as</strong>e of fire, meanwhile progres-<br />
sively losing his own firepower. The<br />
Germans tend to characterize the<br />
American artillery fire <strong>as</strong> methodical,<br />
schematic, and w<strong>as</strong>teful. T<strong>here</strong> is con-<br />
siderable indication that the German<br />
commanders quickly recognized and<br />
made gainful tactical use of the gaps at<br />
division and corps boundaries w<strong>here</strong> the<br />
defenders conventionally failed to pro-<br />
vide overlapping fire between zones. Al-<br />
so, it is probable, <strong>as</strong> the enemy alleges,<br />
that the American gunners fired a very<br />
considerable weight of ammunition for<br />
each German killed. On the other hand<br />
the record is replete with instances in<br />
which the attacker w<strong>as</strong> diverted from his<br />
axis of advance and his scheme of ma-<br />
659<br />
neuver w<strong>as</strong> destroyed by American ar-<br />
tillery fire, even when he suffered little<br />
physical damage. This phenomenon be-<br />
came even more apparent after the<br />
American spotter planes took to the air.<br />
The German offensive ph<strong>as</strong>e of the<br />
Ardennes operation, with its high de-<br />
gree of fluidity and dispersion, may of-<br />
fer profitable suggestions for the future<br />
fluid battlefield. The experience of the<br />
First <strong>Army</strong>, which generously sent its<br />
medium artillery reserves south to stif-<br />
fen the defense, showed the hazard in<br />
moving isolated and road-bound units<br />
with heavy equipment across the grain<br />
of the enemy advance, even when the at-<br />
tack w<strong>as</strong> believed to be miles away.<br />
Medium and heavy corps artillery units<br />
were quite <strong>as</strong> vulnerable to enemy<br />
ground attack <strong>as</strong> the forward divisional<br />
artillery, particularly when the attacker<br />
w<strong>as</strong> moving cross-country and the artil-<br />
lery equipment w<strong>as</strong> difficult to displace<br />
and bound to the road. Displacing single<br />
batteries by leapfrog tactics in order to<br />
maintain unbroken defensive fires failed<br />
repeatedly during the first days of the<br />
Ardennes, largely because of the split-<br />
ting effect of the German ground <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault that isolated firing batteries and<br />
crippled control or resupply by the<br />
headquarters battery. Those forward<br />
American batteries which worked their<br />
guns, brought them off, and lived to<br />
fire another day, normally owed their<br />
tactical survival to other arms and weap-<br />
ons. The artillery battalion of 1944<br />
w<strong>as</strong> not organically constructed or<br />
equipped to beat off close-in infantry<br />
or armored <strong>as</strong>sault, but the fortuitous<br />
attachment of antiaircraft weapons sec-<br />
tions, although these no longer did much<br />
service in their primary role, gave the<br />
gunners an antipersonnel weapon which
660 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
proved to be murderously effective. The<br />
attachment of tank destroyers to the ar-<br />
tillery battalions also paid substantial<br />
dividends in the early days of the cam-<br />
paign. The most effective defense of<br />
beleaguered field artillery units, how-<br />
ever, w<strong>as</strong> that provided by prompt<br />
counterattack delivered by neighboring<br />
infantry or tanks, a tactic which turned<br />
on accurate local intelligence, unbroken<br />
communications, and the enemy inabil-<br />
ity to deflect the counterattack force<br />
with heavy supporting weapons or<br />
mines.<br />
The Air Weapon<br />
Postwar estimates of the Luftwaffe<br />
operational strength <strong>as</strong>signed to support<br />
the ground attack on 16 December set<br />
the number of first-line planes at about<br />
fifteen hundred. 5 But German planes<br />
never, in the course of the campaign,<br />
appeared over the battle area in any such<br />
number. OB WEST records 849 sorties<br />
dispatched to <strong>as</strong>sist the ground attack on<br />
18 December, the largest Luftwaffe at-<br />
tempt to intervene directly in the<br />
Ardennes battle. The tabulation of Ger-<br />
man sorties is somewhat misleading,<br />
however, because a relatively small pro-<br />
portion of these sorties ever reached the<br />
battlefield in a ground support role and<br />
most were engaged by the Allied air<br />
forces far to the e<strong>as</strong>t of the ground com-<br />
bat zone. On 24 December, for example,<br />
a day characterized by the IX Tactical<br />
Air Command <strong>as</strong> the heaviest Luftwaffe<br />
effort since D-day, the Third <strong>Army</strong>-<br />
whose counterattack obviously invited<br />
retaliation from the air-reported the<br />
5 <strong>Of</strong>fice of the Director of Intelligence, U.S.<br />
Strategic Air Forces in Europe, Allied Air Power<br />
and the Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive (n.d.) .<br />
sighting of only one enemy squadron.<br />
During the first ten days of the campaign<br />
the Luftwaffe sorties sent into the air<br />
varied between six and eight hundred<br />
per day. In the l<strong>as</strong>t six days of December<br />
the Luftwaffe w<strong>as</strong> driven back to the air<br />
space over the Third Reich and the num-<br />
ber of planes actually reaching the<br />
battlefield numbered between sixty and<br />
eighty a day, most of which struck under<br />
cover of darkness, <strong>as</strong> in the c<strong>as</strong>e of the<br />
73-plane raid over B<strong>as</strong>togne on 30 De-<br />
cember.<br />
At no point in the story of the ground<br />
battle can any crippling impact of Ger-<br />
man air attack be discerned. Nor w<strong>as</strong><br />
the Luftwaffe notably successful in de-<br />
fending the supply lines west of the<br />
Rhine. The German fighters did exact<br />
a heavy toll from the Allied planes ham-<br />
mering at rail yards, bridges, and supply<br />
installations. Thus the 39 1st Bombard-<br />
ment Group, flying Marauders without<br />
escort to attack the Ahrweiler railroad<br />
bridge, w<strong>as</strong> jumped by about seventy-<br />
five German fighters, and lost one-half<br />
of its thirty-six planes, though it did<br />
knock out the bridge.<br />
In the first week of the German ad-<br />
vance the well-established Allied supe-<br />
riority in the air hardly made itself felt<br />
in the battle area, although two fighter-<br />
bomber groups from IX Tactical Air<br />
Command did intervene in the fighting<br />
around Stavelot and Malmédy on 18<br />
December. But the adverse weather<br />
which denied the tactical air forces ac-<br />
cess to the fight on the ground did not<br />
halt the bombers and on 18 December<br />
bombers from the RAF, began an inter-<br />
diction attack seventy-five miles or more<br />
to the e<strong>as</strong>t of the battle line. It is diffi-<br />
cult to me<strong>as</strong>ure the damage done the<br />
German rail system west of the Rhine
EPILOGUE 661<br />
by Allied bombing during this early<br />
ph<strong>as</strong>e because the exorbitant amount of<br />
military traffic moving to support the<br />
attack resulted in severe congestion<br />
which, on a number of feeder lines,<br />
forced troops and equipment to detrain<br />
far to the e<strong>as</strong>t of their planned destina-<br />
tion.<br />
When the weather altered on the 23d,<br />
battlefield operations started to take pre-<br />
cedence over the Allied interdiction ef-<br />
fort. The IX, XIX, and XXIX Tacti-<br />
cal Air Commands flew 294 sorties<br />
against targets in the forward edge of<br />
the battlefield, but this effort still rep-<br />
resented only a minor fraction of the<br />
Allied air operations designed to stall<br />
the German advance. The Eighth Air<br />
Force and 9th Bombardment Division<br />
dropped 1,300 tons of bombs on the en-<br />
emy supply lines west of the Rhine,<br />
while the Royal Air Force Bomber Com-<br />
mand hit the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> railhead at<br />
Trier with 150 planes.<br />
On 24 December The Allied air<br />
forces threw into action the greatest<br />
number of planes employed during the<br />
Ardennes. The Americans flew 1,138 tac-<br />
tical sorties (of which 734 were ground<br />
support missions in the battle zone) and<br />
2,442 bomber sorties. Most of the latter<br />
were aimed at German airfields, but<br />
1,521 tons of bombs were laid on rail<br />
centers and bridges. The 2d Tactical Air<br />
Force (British) flew 1,243 sorties dur-<br />
ing the day. T<strong>here</strong> followed three days<br />
of good flying weather which gave the<br />
American and British fighter-bombers<br />
opportunity for a sustained attack<br />
against German supply movement, road<br />
centers, and armored vehicles. Com-<br />
mencing on 28 December very poor<br />
flying weather intervened to give the<br />
German divisions some respite from air<br />
attack. The Allies put up less than a<br />
hundred battlefield sorties on this and<br />
succeeding days, but even such a limited<br />
effort had an important effect on the<br />
ground battle, <strong>as</strong> witness the interven-<br />
tion of the 406th Bombardment Group<br />
in the B<strong>as</strong>togne fight on the 30th.<br />
The direct damage inflicted on the<br />
German ground formations by the Al-<br />
lied fighter-bombers is difficult to gauge<br />
and, of course, varied greatly. A regi-<br />
mental attack set by the 26th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division on 23 December had<br />
to be postponed until the Jabos quit<br />
for the day; on that same date the en-<br />
tire 116th Panzer Division marched in<br />
broad daylight from Hotton to Marche<br />
without difficulty. Yet t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> a very<br />
appreciable incre<strong>as</strong>e in night attacks by<br />
the German ground forces <strong>as</strong> the Jabos’<br />
killing power mounted, beginning on<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> Day and culminating in Mo-<br />
del's order on the 26th forbidding major<br />
march movements in daylight.<br />
The Allied tactical air operations in<br />
the main were directed against armored<br />
fighting vehicles, motor transport, and<br />
large troop concentrations. The thin-<br />
skinned supply vehicles which lacked<br />
tracks to carry them off the narrow,<br />
winding roads presented an e<strong>as</strong>y target.<br />
German tanks were another matter. The<br />
IX, XIX, and XXIX Tactical Air Com-<br />
mands and 2d Tactical Air Force (Brit-<br />
ish) claimed the destruction of 413 en-<br />
emy armored vehicles. But a sample<br />
ground count of stricken German armor<br />
sets the number of kills inflicted by air<br />
attack at about a tenth the number<br />
claimed by the fighter-bomber pilots. 6<br />
6 2d Tactical Air Force Operational Research<br />
Section, Report 19, The Contribution of the Air<br />
Forces to the Stemming of the Enemy Thrust in<br />
the Ardennes, 16–26 December 1944 (September<br />
1945).
662<br />
Air attack against the choke points<br />
that developed along the main and sub-<br />
sidiary German supply roads seriously<br />
impeded both tactical and logistic move-<br />
ment, but much of the over-all delay<br />
should be charged to poor German traf-<br />
fic control and road maintenance. Here<br />
again the record of achievement by the<br />
air is uneven. Movement on the Kob-<br />
lenz-Trier autobahn, a major supply<br />
artery for the two southern armies, nev-<br />
er w<strong>as</strong> seriously restricted by Allied air<br />
attack. As might be expected, the over-<br />
all effectiveness of air attacks along the<br />
roads turned on the configuration of<br />
the ground. The 9th Bombardment Di-<br />
vision put 136 tons of high explosive on<br />
St. Vith, which stood in the open with<br />
a wealth of byp<strong>as</strong>s routes around it on<br />
relatively level ground, and stopped the<br />
German traffic not at all. Even when the<br />
RAF dropped 1,140 tons in a carpet<br />
bombing attack at St. Vith, the road cen-<br />
ter w<strong>as</strong> out of commission for only a<br />
day. Yet a mere 150 tons put on La<br />
Roche over a period of two days stopped<br />
all major movement in this sector of<br />
the Ardennes road net. La Roche, be it<br />
noted, lay at the bottom of a gorge with<br />
access only through deep defiles.<br />
The damaging effect of the Allied<br />
air attacks against rail lines, bridges,<br />
and marshaling yards at and west of the<br />
Rhine is quite clear in the history of the<br />
Ardennes campaign, but the time se-<br />
quence between specific rail failures<br />
and the resulting impact on German<br />
front-line operations is difficult to trace.<br />
From 25 December to 2 January the<br />
Eighth Air Force, 9th Bombardment<br />
Division, and Royal Air Force Bomber<br />
Command made daily attacks against<br />
selected railway bridges and marshaling<br />
yards using an average of 1,800 tons of<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
bombs per day. Yet the day before this<br />
bombing campaign began, feeder rail<br />
lines in the Eifel had been so crippled<br />
by air attack that through movement<br />
from the Rhine to the army railheads<br />
w<strong>as</strong> no longer possible and supplies were<br />
being moved by truck and wagon be-<br />
tween the “traffic islands” w<strong>here</strong> rail<br />
movement remained in effect. German<br />
reports indicate that this transshipment<br />
from one mode of transport to another–<br />
and back again–cost at le<strong>as</strong>t forty-eight<br />
hours’ delay. By the 26th railway bridges<br />
were out on the vital Ahr and Moselle<br />
lines, supporting the two southern<br />
armies, and the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> railhead<br />
had been pushed back to Wengerohr,<br />
near Wittlich. On the 28th the rail cen-<br />
ter at Koblenz, supporting the German<br />
left wing, w<strong>as</strong> put out of operation. And<br />
by the close of the year German repair<br />
organizations could do no more than at-<br />
tempt to keep some of the railroad is-<br />
land traffic moving.<br />
In retrospect the German effort to<br />
keep the railroads operating in support<br />
of <strong>Army</strong> Group B w<strong>as</strong> phenomenal.<br />
Five of the eight railroad bridges across<br />
the Rhine were put out of service tem-<br />
porarily, generally by bomb damage to<br />
the bridge approaches, but all came<br />
back into service. Allied air inflicted<br />
eighty-five breaks on the <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
B rail lines west of the Rhine and fifty-<br />
four of these were repaired. But in the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t week before the Allied ground<br />
counteroffensive any hope of main-<br />
taining a satisfactory ratio between<br />
damage and repair had vanished. <strong>Of</strong><br />
nine railroad bridges over the Ahr,<br />
Moselle, and Nette Rivers, which were<br />
designated <strong>as</strong> high priority targets for air<br />
attack, eight were put out of operation<br />
on one or more occ<strong>as</strong>ions, while for the
EPILOGUE<br />
six restored the average repair time<br />
w<strong>as</strong> five days per bridge. The cumula-<br />
tive effect of this kind of damage sim-<br />
ply saturated the German capabilities<br />
for rail repair. 7<br />
Despite Allied domination of the air<br />
over the Ardennes, the Eifel, and the<br />
Rhine plain, the battlefield itself and<br />
the German armies t<strong>here</strong>in never were<br />
isolated. Could the isolation of the<br />
battlefield have been accomplished? The<br />
terrain, with its sequence of river bar-<br />
riers and multitude of winding, steep<br />
gradients, w<strong>as</strong> favorable to air interdic-<br />
tion. But the tactical ingredients and<br />
formula to achieve complete success were<br />
missing in late 1944. Sturdy rail bridges,<br />
particularly when defended by ground<br />
to air fire, proved hard to damage and<br />
even harder to destroy. Even the smaller<br />
bridges, such <strong>as</strong> those attacked in the<br />
Ahr River campaign, took some 250 tons<br />
of high explosive to cripple. Rail cut-<br />
ting attacks caused traffic islands but<br />
never succeeded in rooting out these is-<br />
lands or the movement between them.<br />
Movement by thin-skinned vehicles on<br />
trails, roads, and highways seemed par-<br />
ticularly vulnerable but the physical<br />
blockage of the roads, <strong>as</strong> distinct from<br />
vehicular destruction, could be achieved<br />
only at particularly favorable points<br />
and for relatively short intervals of time.<br />
Finally, the Allied inability to operate<br />
aircraft in a ground <strong>as</strong>sault role during<br />
the night and the long stretches of bad<br />
7 This section is b<strong>as</strong>ed on the extensive research<br />
done by Charles V. P. von Luttichau in his<br />
manuscript, German Rail Communications in the<br />
Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive 1944-1945, and Royce L.<br />
Thompson’s equally careful and detailed study,<br />
Tactical Air Ph<strong>as</strong>e of the Ardennes Campaign.<br />
Neither of these manuscript studies h<strong>as</strong> been<br />
published, but both should be of great interest<br />
to students of logistics.<br />
663<br />
flying weather provided a built-in guar-<br />
antee that the minimum supply and<br />
reinforcement requirements of the Ger-<br />
man armies would be met.<br />
Although the Allied air forces failed<br />
to isolate the Ardennes battlefield, they<br />
did succeed in these days in dealing the<br />
Luftwaffe a mortal blow, thus making<br />
the t<strong>as</strong>k of their comrades on the ground<br />
much e<strong>as</strong>ier in 1945, on both the West-<br />
ern and the E<strong>as</strong>tern Fronts. Generalleut-<br />
nant Adolf Galland, commander of the<br />
Luftwaffe fighter arm, h<strong>as</strong> written the<br />
Luftwaffe epitaph in this manner: “The<br />
Luftwafle received its death blow at<br />
the Ardennes offensive. In unfamiliar<br />
conditions and with insufficient train-<br />
ing and combat experience, our numer-<br />
ical strength had no effect. It w<strong>as</strong> deci-<br />
mated while in transfer, on the ground,<br />
in large air battles, especially during<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong>, and w<strong>as</strong> finally destroyed.” 8<br />
Logistics<br />
During the years following the in-<br />
v<strong>as</strong>ion of Poland the German munitions<br />
of war had w<strong>as</strong>ted away, so much so<br />
that in December 1944 the German<br />
armies in the Ardennes were fighting a<br />
poor man’s battle. The total stock of<br />
105-mm. gun-howitzer ammunition at<br />
the beginning of November 1944 w<strong>as</strong><br />
only half the size of the stock available<br />
on 1 September 1939 and the number of<br />
150-mm. rounds w<strong>as</strong> less than a third<br />
the number stocked in Germany at the<br />
beginning of the Polish campaign.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> still possible even so to gather a<br />
substantial ammunition reserve for the<br />
Ardennes offensive, and after the war<br />
8 Adolf<br />
Galland, The First and The L<strong>as</strong>t (New<br />
York: Henry Holt & Co., 1960), p. 242.
664 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
the supply officers at OKW were able<br />
to say that before the U.S. counterattack<br />
on 3 January 1945 t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no short-<br />
age of artillery ammunition in the field.<br />
This statement merely reflects the<br />
rarefied and isolated view of the high<br />
headquarters, for despite the 100 am-<br />
munition trains of the special Fuehrer<br />
Reserve the troops in the Ardennes op-<br />
eration did suffer from a shortage of<br />
ammunition. 9 This shortage w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
ported <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> 21 December by the<br />
divisions attacking at B<strong>as</strong>togne. T<strong>here</strong>-<br />
after, <strong>as</strong> the American front solidified,<br />
the Germans consumed ammunition at a<br />
rate of 1,200 tons per day, a rate much<br />
higher than predicted by the OKW<br />
planning staffs but less than the tactical<br />
requirements of the battle. The lack of<br />
ammunition should be charged to trans-<br />
port failure rather than to paucity of<br />
artillery shells at the Rhine dumps. The<br />
Panzer Lehr Division, for example, first<br />
reported that it had run out of g<strong>as</strong>,<br />
then on 28 December reported a short-<br />
age of ammunition because of the “lack<br />
of transport.”<br />
The American troops, by contr<strong>as</strong>t,<br />
never suffered any notable failure of<br />
ammunition at the guns. In fact, the<br />
only munitions which appear to have<br />
been in short supply during the Ger-<br />
man offensive were antitank mines and<br />
bazooka rounds. The demand for these<br />
items and rifle and machine gun am-<br />
munition w<strong>as</strong> constant, but the supply<br />
line w<strong>as</strong> kept full by calling forward<br />
bazooka rockets and small arms ammu-<br />
9 This reserve w<strong>as</strong> only fifty of the normal<br />
ammunition trains; each had been divided in two<br />
for protection against air attack. On 13 December<br />
the ammunition on hand and in shipment for<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group B totaled 15,099 tons, but 5,353 tons<br />
were allocated to the Fifteenth <strong>Army</strong>, which did<br />
not, <strong>as</strong> planned, take part in the offensive.<br />
nition from ships in the English Channel<br />
and North Sea. Also, the 12th <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group had built up a very sizable re-<br />
serve of artillery ammunition during<br />
the first half of December in prepara-<br />
tion for the Roer River attacks. Most<br />
of the American ammunition stocks<br />
were put on wheels (trucks or railroad<br />
cars) after 19 December. The Third<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, for example, w<strong>as</strong> able to move<br />
an average of 4,500 tons of ammuni-<br />
tion per day during the l<strong>as</strong>t half of De-<br />
cember and consumed, on the average,<br />
only 3,500 tons per day.<br />
German tank losses during the oper-<br />
ation are unknown but appear to have<br />
been very high, probably <strong>as</strong> much from<br />
mechanical failure <strong>as</strong> from battle dam-<br />
age. For the 1,700 to 1,800 tanks and<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns in <strong>Army</strong> Group B, t<strong>here</strong><br />
were only six tank repair companies.<br />
Even worse w<strong>as</strong> the shortage of tank re-<br />
trievers, and, after 23 December, the<br />
few available were extremely hard hit<br />
by air attack. The spare parts situa-<br />
tion w<strong>as</strong> so bad that new German tanks<br />
were cannibalized at a depot west of<br />
Koblenz. Three hundred and forty<br />
new tanks were <strong>as</strong>signed to the Western<br />
Front during the campaign, but only<br />
125 can be traced <strong>as</strong> actually reaching<br />
the armored divisions.<br />
The First and Third U.S. Armies had<br />
a full complement of medium tanks<br />
when the Germans struck, that is, 1,882<br />
between them. During the l<strong>as</strong>t half of<br />
December the two armies lost a total<br />
of 471 medium tanks. These losses were<br />
partially made up when 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
rele<strong>as</strong>ed 351 Shermans which had been<br />
allocated for British use. A few Amer-<br />
ican ordnance companies were overrun<br />
in the first hours of the battle, but<br />
most of the tank maintenance person-
EPILOGUE 665<br />
nel and equipment were moved out<br />
of enemy reach and continued to func-<br />
tion effectively. The losses in divisional<br />
artillery pieces were replaced in part<br />
by a British loan of 100 25-pounders<br />
plus 300,000 rounds of ammunition for<br />
them. The 2,500 machine guns lost dur-<br />
ng the German attack were promptly<br />
replaced from American ordnance<br />
depots.<br />
The problem of transport for supply<br />
and evacuation w<strong>as</strong> one which the Ger-<br />
mans failed to solve in December 1944.<br />
Perhaps the German staffs and com-<br />
manders had been so long on the de-<br />
fensive that they had forgotten the<br />
special transport requirements engen-<br />
dered by offensive operations. In this re-<br />
spect Hitler and Jodl, in their borrow-<br />
ing from 1918, failed to remember Lu-<br />
dendorff who, when preparing to con-<br />
struct the mobile attack divisisions for<br />
the German offensives, stated that the<br />
shortage of horses w<strong>as</strong> the single most<br />
important problem in mounting the<br />
German attacks. Truck w<strong>as</strong>tage through<br />
mechanical failure and combat attrition<br />
had been extremely heavy all through<br />
1944, and it is estimated that the new<br />
trucks coming off the production lines<br />
numbered less than half those destroyed<br />
in the field during the same period.<br />
Not only were t<strong>here</strong> too few trucks but<br />
many divisions were equipped with<br />
poor, worn-out booty vehicles that sim-<br />
ply fell by the wayside along the bad<br />
roads of the Ardennes and had to be<br />
abandoned because t<strong>here</strong> were no re-<br />
pair parts. At one time the German<br />
armies had been able to rely on the<br />
railroad system <strong>as</strong> the backbone of army<br />
transport. From the beginning of good<br />
flying weather on 23 December this w<strong>as</strong><br />
no longer possible and by 27 December<br />
it may be concluded that the offensive<br />
in the main w<strong>as</strong> fed and armed by a<br />
road transport system quite unequal to<br />
the load forced upon it.<br />
When it is remembered that some of<br />
the German divisions in the Ardennes<br />
had more horses than the German in-<br />
fantry division of 1918, one h<strong>as</strong> a clearer<br />
picture of the supply problem. Resup-<br />
ply w<strong>as</strong> accomplished over very long<br />
distances, often clear back to the Rhine,<br />
over bad roads which could not be kept<br />
in repair, and with much transport<br />
geared to horsepower which sickened<br />
and died. The heavy snowfalls on<br />
the supply roads over the Eifel,<br />
particularly after 24 December, coupled<br />
with the damage done by Allied air<br />
attack at road centers and against<br />
moving supply columns are reflected<br />
in German estimates that rated road<br />
capacities were reduced in fact by at<br />
le<strong>as</strong>t a third. From Christm<strong>as</strong> on, some<br />
of the supply trains from forward com-<br />
bat units were going back <strong>as</strong> far <strong>as</strong> Bonn<br />
for ammunition and supplies. On the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t day of the year the Panzer Lehr<br />
commander ruefully noted that a supply<br />
train he had sent to Merlscheid near St.<br />
Vith, on 25 December had not yet re-<br />
turned.<br />
In some respects the American trans-<br />
port system opposed an enemy system<br />
which had many of the outdated charac-<br />
teristics of 1918. Not only did the Amer-<br />
ican divisions have a very large num-<br />
ber of vehicles and trailers organic to<br />
the unit, but the number of line of com-<br />
munications trucks and trains available<br />
in the forward area w<strong>as</strong> enormous. Per-<br />
haps even more important, the move-<br />
ment of American ground transport<br />
w<strong>as</strong> unaffected by har<strong>as</strong>sment and at-<br />
tack from the air. The First <strong>Army</strong> moved
666<br />
more than 48,000 vehicles to the battle<br />
zone during the period 17–26 December,<br />
and the XII Corps used only two roads<br />
to move 11,000 vehicles in four days over<br />
a distance of 100 miles. In contr<strong>as</strong>t to<br />
the bitter German experience, the Amer-<br />
ican tactical and supply moves seldom<br />
were beset by road stoppages and traf-<br />
fic jams, except, of course, in the ini-<br />
tial hours of the German penetration.<br />
Although it is manifestly true that the<br />
Germans made good intelligence usage<br />
of the American radio traffic control net,<br />
this w<strong>as</strong> balanced by the speed and cer-<br />
tainty with which American transport<br />
moved.<br />
One may also contr<strong>as</strong>t the tactical<br />
availability of the great American sup-<br />
ply complex which had been built up<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t of the Meuse with that prepared<br />
by the Germans e<strong>as</strong>t of the Rhine River.<br />
The German offensive forced the Amer-<br />
icans away from the forward truck-<br />
heads, with their limited capacity, back<br />
on the almost unlimited resources avail-<br />
able at railheads. Certainly t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
some danger involved in the mainte-<br />
nance of the great supply depots so close<br />
to the uncertain battle line. Brig. Gen.<br />
Robert M. Littlejohn w<strong>as</strong> ordered on<br />
three occ<strong>as</strong>ions to evacuate the big<br />
depots at Liège, but instead simply<br />
brought in more supplies. American<br />
supply officers seem to have learned<br />
something about logistic flexibility <strong>as</strong> a<br />
result of the pursuit operations across<br />
France in the summer of 1944. Finally,<br />
the much criticized weight of the Amer-<br />
ican logistic “tail” paid off during the<br />
Ardennes, for t<strong>here</strong> always w<strong>as</strong> enough<br />
extra transport to meet unusual de-<br />
mands for supply and troop movement.<br />
Despite the decline in the production<br />
of liquid fuel during 1944, Hitler w<strong>as</strong><br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
able to am<strong>as</strong>s a POL reserve for the<br />
Ardennes offensive which equaled that<br />
available to the German armies on the<br />
eve of the Allied inv<strong>as</strong>ion, and the final<br />
figure of the POL allocated to <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group B w<strong>as</strong> over four million gallons.<br />
Using the German me<strong>as</strong>ure of one “con-<br />
sumption unit” <strong>as</strong> the amount of fuel<br />
required to move all the vehicles in a<br />
formation a distance of sixty-three miles,<br />
it may be reckoned that of the five con-<br />
sumption units requested by Model only<br />
one and one-half to two were at corps<br />
dumps on 16 December; yet t<strong>here</strong> may<br />
have been <strong>as</strong> much <strong>as</strong> nine or ten con-<br />
sumption units available at railheads<br />
near the Rhine River.<br />
The course of the campaign showed<br />
at le<strong>as</strong>t three errors in German plan-<br />
ning. POL distribution failed to move<br />
with the same speed <strong>as</strong> the armored ad-<br />
vance. The bad terrain and weather en-<br />
countered in the Ardennes reduced the<br />
mileage gained from a tankful of fuel<br />
by one-half. And, finally, the expecta-<br />
tion that the spearheads would move<br />
in part on captured g<strong>as</strong>oline w<strong>as</strong> mis-<br />
takenly optimistic. <strong>Army</strong> Group B<br />
POL consumption reached a peak of<br />
close to 2,000 cubic meters on 18 De-<br />
cember, but by 23 December the daily<br />
usage rate w<strong>as</strong> about half that figure.<br />
In other words, the supply of liquid<br />
fuel failed to keep pace with the tac-<br />
tical demand.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> are two ph<strong>as</strong>es in the history<br />
of German liquid fuel supply during<br />
the Ardennes campaign-the one be-<br />
fore and the one after 23 December<br />
when the Allies took to the air over<br />
the battle zone. During the first ph<strong>as</strong>e<br />
the movement of POL w<strong>as</strong> impeded by<br />
bad roads and traffic congestion. Vehi-<br />
cles failed or ran out of fuel and were
EPILOGUE 667<br />
abandoned by the roadside, thus re-<br />
ducing the total transport tonnage for<br />
bringing POL forward. The attempts<br />
to introduce horse-drawn supply or ar-<br />
tillery columns into the stream of mo-<br />
torized traffic during the first days of<br />
the offensive greatly slowed the distri-<br />
bution system. As early <strong>as</strong> 20 December<br />
the 12th SS Panzer Division, scheduled<br />
<strong>as</strong> one of the leading formations in the<br />
Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> advance, w<strong>as</strong><br />
brought to a halt because t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
fuel except a few gallons for the mech-<br />
anized reconnaissance battalion. On 21<br />
December the 2d SS Panzer Division<br />
w<strong>as</strong> ordered to relieve the 560th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division in the battle at<br />
Fraiture but w<strong>as</strong> unable to move for<br />
thirty-six hours because t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> no<br />
POL. In the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> t<strong>here</strong><br />
were reports <strong>as</strong> early <strong>as</strong> 19 December<br />
of a “badly strained” fuel situation.<br />
Three days later Luettwitz, the XLVII<br />
Panzer Corps commander, told Man-<br />
teuffel that the advance of his armor<br />
w<strong>as</strong> “gravely endangered” because of<br />
the failure of fuel supply. During this<br />
ph<strong>as</strong>e t<strong>here</strong> seems to have been consid-<br />
erable pirating, in a disorderly manner,<br />
from the forward POL dumps. Eventu-<br />
ally German commanders learned to<br />
send a reconnaissance detail to the<br />
fuel dumps before they committed<br />
their supply trains in a fuel-consuming<br />
trip to what might be a dry supply<br />
point. It can be concluded that the Ger-<br />
man offensive already w<strong>as</strong> seriously<br />
crippled by the failure of transport and<br />
the POL distributing system before the<br />
Allied Jabos entered the fight.<br />
The supply ph<strong>as</strong>e after 23 December<br />
is characterized by Allied fighter-<br />
bombers pounding roads and supply<br />
points while snowdrifts stopped the<br />
movement of traffic through the Eifel.<br />
The POL shortage in the Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong> seems to have <strong>as</strong>sumed dr<strong>as</strong>tic<br />
proportions in the period 23 to 25 De-<br />
cember. The Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> in<br />
dire straits by 24 December, in part be-<br />
cause of the arrival of armored and<br />
mechanized formations which had<br />
come into the army area without<br />
reserve fuel. Even when bad fly-<br />
ing weather blunted the edge of<br />
the Allied air attack, the sporadic stop-<br />
page of supply movement at the ground<br />
level continued. By the end of Decem-<br />
ber three of the five divisions in the<br />
XLVII Panzer Corps were practically<br />
immobile. All this while, however, the<br />
10th SS Panzer Division of the OKW<br />
Reserve sat in an <strong>as</strong>sembly area just<br />
west of Bonn with a total POL load<br />
of eight consumption units in its train.<br />
Quite obviously the German problem<br />
had been transport rather than an over-<br />
all shortage of fuel.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is no indication that American<br />
units suffered seriously from the lack<br />
of POL, although, of course, t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong><br />
always the tactical difficulty of with-<br />
drawing from contact with the enemy<br />
at night for fuel resupply, partic-<br />
ularly in the more mobile ph<strong>as</strong>es of<br />
the campaign. Some American g<strong>as</strong>oline<br />
w<strong>as</strong> lost to Peiper, but the total amount-<br />
ed to probably no more than 100,000<br />
gallons. It is known that Peiper’s supply<br />
officer had a map of American POL in-<br />
stallations, but this did Peiper little<br />
good. Between 17 and 19 December<br />
American supply troops successfully<br />
evacuated over three million gallons of<br />
POL from the Spa-Stavelot area. The<br />
biggest Allied loss to the enemy w<strong>as</strong><br />
400,000 gallons of g<strong>as</strong>oline, destroyed<br />
on 17 December by a V–1 strike at
668 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Liège.<br />
The Germans “fueled” their horses<br />
with greater e<strong>as</strong>e than their motor ve-<br />
hicles. Straw and hay were plentiful in<br />
the area, although an order had to be<br />
put out forbidding the use of straw <strong>as</strong><br />
bedding material for the troops, and<br />
those units which came late into an area<br />
found foraging sparse. Potatoes and live-<br />
stock were taken from the local popula-<br />
tion in large quantities, but the supply<br />
of breadstuff w<strong>as</strong> barely adequate,<br />
chiefly because of troubles in transport-<br />
ing bulk flour to the field bakery units.<br />
It w<strong>as</strong> necessary t<strong>here</strong>fore to reduce the<br />
bread ration to all but front-line troops.<br />
The Americans, <strong>as</strong> usual, were well fed<br />
during this operation. The only notable<br />
change w<strong>as</strong> the new demand for the<br />
compact K ration in place of the aug-<br />
mented ration, with its fresh meat and<br />
coffee beans, which had been issued<br />
during the slow-moving fighting in the<br />
autumn.<br />
In transporting their wounded, the<br />
Germans experienced grave difficulty.<br />
By the close of December the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> having to haul its<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties clear back to Andernach on<br />
the Rhine at the expense of those freshly<br />
wounded in the firing line. The Amer-<br />
icans lost a number of hospitals, med-<br />
ics, and wounded to the German spear-<br />
head formations, but on the whole were<br />
able to maintain a high standard of<br />
medical care, even in this fluid battle.<br />
In accordance with accepted <strong>Army</strong> prac-<br />
tice both the First and Third Armies<br />
were equipped with hospitals to take<br />
a peak c<strong>as</strong>ualty load. On 1 January<br />
1945, t<strong>here</strong> were a total of nearly 9,000<br />
vacant beds in the hospitals of the two<br />
armies.<br />
Despite the fame of the German <strong>Army</strong><br />
staff corps <strong>as</strong> m<strong>as</strong>ters of supply and log-<br />
istics, a reputation which dated <strong>as</strong> far<br />
back <strong>as</strong> the Franco-Prussian War, the<br />
Ardennes Campaign showed little evi-<br />
dence of this earlier prowess except in<br />
the management of military rail trans-<br />
port and its rapid rehabilitation under<br />
attack. Perhaps the German staff work<br />
in the field w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong> good <strong>as</strong> ever, al-<br />
though t<strong>here</strong> is evidence that it had de-<br />
teriorated in the SS formations. But<br />
quite clearly the wishful thinking in<br />
which Hitler and the OKW staff in-<br />
dulged w<strong>as</strong> no substitute for rigorous<br />
logistical analysis and planning, and<br />
these higher personalities, not the field<br />
commanders, dictated the control and<br />
management of the logistic support for<br />
the German armies in the Ardennes.<br />
One must conclude that the German<br />
offensive of December 1944 lacked the<br />
materiel and service support necessary to<br />
achieve any real me<strong>as</strong>ure of success and,<br />
furthermore, that Hitler and the OKW<br />
staff understood neither the importance<br />
of supply nor its effective organization.<br />
The Turning Point in the<br />
Ardennes<br />
When did the attacking German ar-<br />
mies lose the initiative in their drive to<br />
cross the Meuse, and why? Surprise, the<br />
first element in successful offensive oper-<br />
ations, had been attained by the attacker<br />
on 16 December. The defense had<br />
been surprised by the speed of the ini-<br />
tial <strong>as</strong>sault, by the weight of the attack,<br />
and, later protestations to the contrary,<br />
the American commands-both high<br />
and low-had been deceived <strong>as</strong> to the<br />
point of the attack. The German <strong>as</strong>-<br />
sault forces ruptured the American de-<br />
fenses on the first day of the advance,
EPILOGUE 669<br />
but not quite <strong>as</strong> planned. In the Sixth<br />
Panzer <strong>Army</strong> sector the German staffs<br />
had expected that the infantry <strong>as</strong>sault<br />
would penetrate to a depth of three to<br />
five miles by noon, thus <strong>as</strong>suring a complete<br />
breakthrough within the first<br />
twenty-four hours of the offensive. This<br />
objective w<strong>as</strong> not achieved. On the extreme<br />
north flank the LXVII Corps<br />
made no progress in its drive to reach<br />
the Vesdre River in front of Eupen,<br />
never succeeded in penetrating the<br />
Monschau position, and eventually gave<br />
over this attack to bring the German<br />
north flank infantry screen forward. The<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault to punch a hole at Losheim went<br />
so slowly that the spearhead armor of<br />
the 1st SS Panzer Division w<strong>as</strong> delayed<br />
at its line of departure for at le<strong>as</strong>t six<br />
hours longer than anticipated. 10<br />
The first-day attack by the German<br />
center had been predicated on minimal<br />
initial delays for bridge crossings within<br />
three or four hours; the minimum actual<br />
time of construction proved to be<br />
seven to eight hours. Furthermore, no<br />
account had been taken of delays which<br />
might be incurred on the west banks<br />
<strong>as</strong> the result of American demolitions,<br />
bomb cratering, and the like. On top<br />
of this the German motorized <strong>as</strong>sault,<br />
<strong>as</strong> it left the river line, w<strong>as</strong> forced onto<br />
exit roads which brought the Germans<br />
squarely against organized American<br />
strongpoints. The adverse impact of<br />
this collection of terrain and tactical<br />
factors is best attested by the experience<br />
of the armored reconnaissance battalions<br />
leading the 26th Volks Grenadier<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault: these formations were delayed<br />
at the river by ineffectual bridge builders,<br />
they were slowed on the Gemünd-<br />
10 For these plans, see the LXVII AK: KTB<br />
Anlagen, 12 Dec 44.<br />
Hosingen road by bomb craters and<br />
abatis, and, when they reached the west-<br />
ern ridge, the American defense of Ho-<br />
singen forced a long halt and ultimate<br />
detour. This episode proved to be only<br />
one of numerous delays on the Fifth<br />
Panzer <strong>as</strong>sault front, and that army, <strong>as</strong><br />
a result, did not reach its first-day ob-<br />
jectives until after midnight of 17 De-<br />
cember.<br />
On the German south wing the Sev-<br />
enth <strong>Army</strong> had even more trouble with<br />
its bridges than the northern neighbor.<br />
The green and ill-equipped 212th Volks<br />
Grenadier Division took forty-eight<br />
hours to throw a 16-ton bridge over the<br />
Sure, and along the entire army front<br />
the infantry elements were forced to<br />
carry the <strong>as</strong>sault for the first three days<br />
without direct heavy weapon support.<br />
The LXXX Corps, fighting to bring<br />
the left wing of the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> into<br />
a favorable blocking position, did not<br />
reach its first-day objectives until the<br />
evening of 19 December, At the close<br />
of the first day, then, it can be said<br />
that the German attack had ruptured<br />
the American positions at a number of<br />
points but had not done much to widen<br />
the gaps so created and had failed sig-<br />
nally to destroy the tactical continuity of<br />
the defensive positions at the shoulders<br />
of the <strong>as</strong>sault zone.<br />
The exploitation ph<strong>as</strong>e of the offen-<br />
sive may be timed from the hour at<br />
which Peiper's armor shook itself loose<br />
from the melee at Losheim and broke<br />
into the open, that is, 0400 on 17 De-<br />
cember. Peiper's progress, t<strong>here</strong>fore, is<br />
a good me<strong>as</strong>ure of the speed, planned<br />
and actual, of the German advance. The<br />
1st SS Panzer Division and at le<strong>as</strong>t one<br />
other armored division of the Sixth Pan-<br />
zer <strong>Army</strong> were supposed to be across the
670<br />
rugged plateau of the Hohes Venn by<br />
the close of the second day, with their<br />
leading elements along a north-south<br />
line through Spa and Stavelot. In 1940<br />
a German armored column had covered<br />
this distance in nine hours, albeit with<br />
very slight resistance, and a second col-<br />
umn, following the more circuitous<br />
route now taken by Peiper, consumed<br />
only a day and a half on the road. De-<br />
spite all the delays on the 16th, Peiper<br />
did reach Stavelot on the night of 17<br />
December, but at Stavelot he w<strong>as</strong> forced<br />
to halt-a marked departure from the<br />
German experience of 1940. Recall <strong>as</strong><br />
well that the second of the Sixth Panzer<br />
<strong>Army</strong>’s breakthrough armored divi-<br />
sions, the 12th SS Panzer still w<strong>as</strong> in-<br />
volved in a bitter fight back on the line<br />
of scrimmage at the end of this second<br />
day. The Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> in even<br />
worse c<strong>as</strong>e: no armored exploitation<br />
w<strong>as</strong> yet in progress by the night of 17<br />
December.<br />
If Hitler and OKW expected the ar-<br />
mored columns to reach the Meuse in<br />
forty-eight hours, <strong>as</strong> h<strong>as</strong> been reported,<br />
the German offensive w<strong>as</strong> seriously be-<br />
hind schedule at the close of the second<br />
day of combat. If, <strong>as</strong> the German<br />
<strong>Army</strong> commanders agree, Model’s own<br />
plan called for the Meuse to be reached<br />
and crossed on the fourth day of the<br />
offensive, then it seems re<strong>as</strong>onable to<br />
<strong>as</strong>sume-<strong>as</strong> the <strong>Army</strong> commanders did<br />
<strong>as</strong>sume-that the lost time could be re-<br />
gained. The immediate problem w<strong>as</strong> to<br />
get armored columns into the open and<br />
into the lead-thus Rundstedt’s order<br />
on the late evening of 17 December<br />
that the armor must at le<strong>as</strong>t keep up<br />
with the foot elements.<br />
On the third day of the attack the<br />
German armor began to acquire momen-<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
tum; the greatest gains made by the ar-<br />
mored spearhead columns actually were<br />
achieved during the night of 18 Decem-<br />
ber. With the way west thus clearing,<br />
the German m<strong>as</strong>s maneuver behind<br />
the armored columns picked up speed<br />
on 19 December, this day representing<br />
the most rapid movement of the entire<br />
offensive. Yet even now the bulk of<br />
German armored weight w<strong>as</strong> not for-<br />
ward nor operating with the speed and<br />
mobility expected of armor. For this<br />
re<strong>as</strong>on the Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> <strong>as</strong>-<br />
signed the t<strong>as</strong>k of exploitation, in place<br />
of the Sixth, on 20 December.<br />
The offensive had gone out of con-<br />
trol, and now would follow a series of<br />
haphazard improvisations. Why had the<br />
German armored m<strong>as</strong>s failed to come<br />
forward <strong>as</strong> planned? These re<strong>as</strong>ons seem<br />
paramount:<br />
1. The initial American defense had<br />
been more tenacious than anticipated;<br />
complete and rapid rupture of the de-<br />
fensive positions had not been achieved.<br />
2. Tactical support and logistic trans-<br />
port had not kept pace with the ad-<br />
vance of the combat formations.<br />
3. Close operational control and flu-<br />
idity of movement for the m<strong>as</strong>s of ma-<br />
neuver required free use of the road net<br />
in the salient. This had been denied the<br />
attacker, most notably at B<strong>as</strong>togne and<br />
St. Vith but at other points <strong>as</strong> well.<br />
4. The flanks of the salient had not<br />
been brought forward to keep pace with<br />
the drive in the center; the shoulders of<br />
the salient had jammed.<br />
5. The operational build-up of the<br />
forces in the salient had taken place<br />
so slowly <strong>as</strong> to deny real depth to the<br />
attack.<br />
6. The tactical reaction of the Amer-<br />
ican forces and their commitment of
EPILOGUE 671<br />
reserves had been more rapid than antic-<br />
ipated.<br />
The German failure to build up the<br />
attacking forces in the salient must be<br />
attributed to Hitler and the OKW staff<br />
since they controlled the operational re-<br />
serves set <strong>as</strong>ide for the Ardennes offen-<br />
sive. Nonetheless, t<strong>here</strong> is some re<strong>as</strong>on<br />
to believe that the German High Com-<br />
mand held back the OKW Reserve divi-<br />
sions because of the physical difficulties<br />
attendant on feeding more troops and<br />
vehicles onto the crowded, tortuous,<br />
muddy roads during the breakdown of<br />
the German transport system in the<br />
first days of the attack.<br />
Rundstedt made his first request for<br />
troops from the OKW Reserve on 17<br />
December, <strong>as</strong>king for the Fuehrer Beg-<br />
leit Brigade, which w<strong>as</strong> in readiness only<br />
thirty-five miles to the rear. He w<strong>as</strong><br />
given the 9th SS Panzer Division, which<br />
w<strong>as</strong> seventy miles from the battlefield,<br />
and it required three separate petitions<br />
from Rundstedt to change the Fuehrer’s<br />
mind. Subsequent requests by OB<br />
WEST for the rele<strong>as</strong>e of two armored<br />
divisions scheduled for early commit-<br />
ment, the 10th SS Panzer and 11th Pan-<br />
zer, produced no result until 23 Decem-<br />
ber when two Volks Grenadier divisions<br />
were brought west in their place. Even<br />
these Volks Grenadier formations had a<br />
string attached by OKW. When, on 26<br />
December, Model <strong>as</strong>ked for a free hand<br />
with all OKW reserves, specifically<br />
mentioning the 10th SS Panzer and 11th<br />
Panzer plus three or four armored divi-<br />
sions from other theaters, he w<strong>as</strong> given<br />
a stone-the two Volks Grenadier divi-<br />
sions brought up on the 23d.<br />
The one thing that a high command<br />
can do in modern war to influence the<br />
battle once it is joined is to allocate re-<br />
serves. Hitler and Jodl repeated in<br />
1944 the mistake made by Ludendorff<br />
during the Amiens battle of 1918 when<br />
the latter failed to throw in the reserves<br />
needed to exploit the unexpected suc-<br />
cess of the Eighteenth <strong>Army</strong>. Specifi-<br />
cally, Hitler and the OKW staff failed<br />
to recognize that the only real hope of<br />
success, after the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong><br />
failure, w<strong>as</strong> to reinforce Manteuffel and<br />
the Fifth.<br />
The story on the American side w<strong>as</strong><br />
quite different, surprisingly so to Hit-<br />
ler and his entourage who held <strong>as</strong> an<br />
article of faith that the American com-<br />
manders, for political re<strong>as</strong>ons, would<br />
make no major troop movements, par-<br />
ticularly if these involved the British,<br />
without prior reference to the White<br />
House and Downing Street. This atti-<br />
tude probably explains the German es-<br />
timate that no major units would be<br />
committed by the defense until the<br />
third day and that the Allied build-up<br />
of a counterattack force would be made<br />
west of the Meuse. Not only did the<br />
German planners fail to comprehend<br />
the degree of initiative that training<br />
and tradition have placed in the hands<br />
of American corps and army command-<br />
ers, they also misunderstood the Amer-<br />
ican doctrine, largely unwritten but<br />
universally accepted, that major forma-<br />
tions having no prebattle relationship<br />
may, under fluid conditions, unite on the<br />
field after the battle is joined. Hitler<br />
seems to have made another and impor-<br />
tant personal miscalculation, namely<br />
that the weak German forces holding<br />
the sectors of the Western Front<br />
north and south of the Ardennes still<br />
retained sufficient strength to grapple<br />
the American divisions opposite them,<br />
and that the Allied commanders would
672 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
t<strong>here</strong>fore hesitate to weaken their forces<br />
in these sectors by stripping away divi-<br />
sions to meet the German attack.<br />
When did the German armies lose<br />
the initiative in the Ardennes? As early<br />
<strong>as</strong> 20 December t<strong>here</strong> are indications<br />
that small clouds of niggling doubt were<br />
present in the minds of some of the<br />
German field commanders, this because<br />
of the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong>’s failure to<br />
ad<strong>here</strong> to the offensive timetable. By<br />
24 December the crippling impact of<br />
Allied air attack, resumed the previous<br />
day <strong>as</strong> the weather broke, w<strong>as</strong> clearly dis-<br />
cernible. Then, too, the course of the<br />
ground battle on that date w<strong>as</strong> equally<br />
adverse. The counterattack by the<br />
Third <strong>Army</strong> menaced the whole south-<br />
ern flank of the German salient, while<br />
the XLVII Panzer Corps, now leading<br />
the Fifth Panzer drive, w<strong>as</strong> so lone and<br />
exposed that the corps commander rec-<br />
ommended a withdrawal of his forward<br />
elements until such time <strong>as</strong> the German<br />
flanks at the tip of the salient could<br />
be covered. This combination of threats<br />
in the air and on the ground led the<br />
Fifth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> commander to con-<br />
clude on 24 December that “the objec-<br />
tive could no longer be attained.” 11<br />
It is a truism that morale is a govern-<br />
ing factor in war. Christm<strong>as</strong> in the Ar-<br />
dennes, 1944, very clearly is a c<strong>as</strong>e in<br />
point. Brig. Gen. S. L. A. Marshall h<strong>as</strong><br />
graphically described the mood of the<br />
American troops in B<strong>as</strong>togne on the<br />
Holy Evening and shown the somber<br />
<strong>as</strong>pect of nostalgia on the part of men<br />
11 Manteuffel in MS # B-151a, p. 160. It is<br />
significant that the OB WEST G–4, Colonel John,<br />
also picks this date <strong>as</strong> the turning point in the<br />
German offensive. See Headquarters 12th <strong>Army</strong><br />
Group, Consolidated Interrogation Report 1, 12<br />
June 1945.<br />
engaged in the grim business of war,<br />
far from home and loved ones. But in<br />
the German camp the sixth Christm<strong>as</strong><br />
of the war seems to have made a truly<br />
indelible impression. The field postm<strong>as</strong>-<br />
ter for Luettwitz’ corps remarks on<br />
the decline in the amount of Christm<strong>as</strong><br />
mail reaching the front-particularly<br />
gift parcels. The German <strong>Army</strong> news-<br />
paper bitterly features a story on the<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> gift presented by a Spanish<br />
restaurateur to Goering–a large supply<br />
of caviar. And the commander of the<br />
276th Volks Grenadier Division, whose<br />
unit fought its hardest battle on Christ-<br />
m<strong>as</strong> Day, expresses the hope that in the<br />
ultimate withdrawal to the cover of the<br />
West Wall his troops will be able to re-<br />
capture the Christm<strong>as</strong> spirit.<br />
The German Christm<strong>as</strong> traditionally<br />
w<strong>as</strong> celebrated on two days, the 25th<br />
and 26th, and at this emotional nadir<br />
of war-weary soldiery the German ar-<br />
mies in the Ardennes sustained a series<br />
of crushing reverses: the left wing of<br />
the Seventh <strong>Army</strong> w<strong>as</strong> driven back to<br />
the Sauer River, over which it had<br />
crossed ten days before; the German ring<br />
around B<strong>as</strong>togne w<strong>as</strong> broken by Patton’s<br />
troops; the 2d Panzer Division received<br />
orders to escape from the Celles pocket;<br />
and throughout the day of the 26th<br />
a developing “crisis” in supply and com-<br />
munications w<strong>as</strong> noted in the journal<br />
at the headquarters of OB WEST. At<br />
1915 on 26 December General Krebs,<br />
Model’s chief of staff, made an apprais-<br />
al of the German situation, “<strong>To</strong>day a<br />
certain culminating point [h<strong>as</strong> been<br />
reached] .” 12<br />
It may be concluded that by the eve.<br />
ning of 26 December the initiative had<br />
12 Contained in OB WEST: KTB, 26 Dec 44.
EPILOGUE 673<br />
p<strong>as</strong>sed from German to American hands.<br />
Before this time the American and Al-<br />
lied forces had reacted to German de.<br />
signs and had abandoned their own.<br />
From this point in time the German<br />
attacker would be off balance and would<br />
take a series of false steps (notably at<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne) which were elicited by the<br />
operations of his opponent and diver-<br />
gent from the <strong>as</strong>signed larger objective.<br />
Even at the time t<strong>here</strong> w<strong>as</strong> recogni-<br />
tion in both camps that 26 December<br />
had been the day of decision. On the<br />
27th the German press and radio aban-<br />
doned the headline treatment of the<br />
Ardennes to feature news from Greece<br />
and Budapest. This same day the<br />
SHAEF propaganda bureau issued in-<br />
structions that Liège, obviously no<br />
longer in danger, should be shown <strong>as</strong><br />
the goal of the German offensive.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> seems to have been a slight<br />
resurgence of forced optimism in the<br />
higher German field headquarters to-<br />
ward the end of December when the<br />
appearance of more troops and guns gave<br />
some flicker of hope that B<strong>as</strong>togne finally<br />
might be captured. But this optimism,<br />
if it w<strong>as</strong> anything more than a disci-<br />
plined and soldierly façade, quickly<br />
faded. On the l<strong>as</strong>t day of December the<br />
OB WEST journal notes that if B<strong>as</strong>-<br />
togne cannot be taken “that is the end<br />
of the offensive operation.” Hitler, no<br />
matter what exhortations he may have<br />
dispatched to Model and Rundstedt,<br />
had turned his attention away from the<br />
Ardennes. On 29 December Rundstedt<br />
received a message that sixty-three new<br />
tanks had come off the <strong>as</strong>sembly line but<br />
that OKW (for which read Hitler)<br />
would decide whether personnel re.<br />
placements and artillery should be sent<br />
OB WEST in their stead-precisely the<br />
first step always taken by the Fuehrer<br />
when abandoning a military venture and<br />
denuding one fighting front to reinforce<br />
another.<br />
The Place of the Ardennes <strong>Of</strong>fensive<br />
in World War II<br />
The German attack in the Ardennes<br />
w<strong>as</strong> to be the l<strong>as</strong>t in the long series of<br />
great offensives and military adventures<br />
initiated by Hitler’s Third Reich in<br />
September 1939. The subsequent at-<br />
tempts at counterattacks in Alsace and<br />
on the Lake Balaton front were bloody<br />
military divertissements occ<strong>as</strong>ioned by<br />
Hitler, nothing more. T<strong>here</strong> would be<br />
days of stubborn fighting in the<br />
Ardennes during January 1945, but the<br />
roads back over the Eifel led straight to<br />
the decimation and collapse of the Ger-<br />
man armies on the banks of the Oder<br />
River, along the Danube, in the Ruhr<br />
pocket, and, at l<strong>as</strong>t, to the bunkers of<br />
Berlin.<br />
What w<strong>as</strong> the true military purpose<br />
of the Ardennes offensive? It h<strong>as</strong> been<br />
alleged by survivors of the German High<br />
Command that this operation w<strong>as</strong> in-<br />
tended to re-establish the military pres-<br />
tige of the Third Reich, carry its people<br />
through the grueling sixth winter of war,<br />
and win a favorable bargaining position<br />
for a suitable and acceptable peace. It<br />
seems more probable, from all that is<br />
known of Hitler’s thought processes in<br />
these l<strong>as</strong>t months of his life, that, <strong>as</strong> in<br />
February 19 18, the German decision w<strong>as</strong><br />
not between war and peace but between<br />
defense and attack. Are the military and<br />
political re<strong>as</strong>ons set forth by Hitler for<br />
his choice of an offensive on the Western<br />
Front, and in the Ardennes sector, to be<br />
accepted at face value? <strong>History</strong> will
674<br />
never know. But t<strong>here</strong> is the strong pos-<br />
sibility that Hitler and his top generals<br />
were motivated by the same impulse<br />
which triggered so many of the bloody<br />
and useless offensives of World War I–<br />
to seize the initiative for its own sake<br />
without a viable strategic objective in<br />
view.<br />
In late December German propagan-<br />
dists claimed that the object of the Ar-<br />
dennes offensive had been to cripple the<br />
attack capabilities of the Allied armies<br />
and chew up their divisions e<strong>as</strong>t of the<br />
Meuse. T<strong>here</strong> also is considerable evi-<br />
dence that Model, and perhaps Rund-<br />
stedt, accepted this <strong>as</strong> a re<strong>as</strong>onable<br />
tactical objective in the operations from<br />
Christm<strong>as</strong> onward. The attainment of<br />
this goal, to chew up Allied divisions and<br />
dull the cutting edge of the American<br />
armies, w<strong>as</strong> achieved in only limited<br />
f<strong>as</strong>hion. The attack of twenty-nine Ger-<br />
man divisions and brigades destroyed<br />
one American infantry division <strong>as</strong> a unit,<br />
badly crippled two infantry divisions,<br />
and cut one armored combat command<br />
to pieces. The total of American battle<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties reported for the period 16<br />
December through 2 January (although<br />
these probably were incomplete returns)<br />
numbered 41,315 officers and men, of<br />
which 4,138 were known to be killed in<br />
action, 20,231 were wounded in action,<br />
and 16,946 were reported missing. Dur-<br />
ing the same period the American forma-<br />
tions in the Ardennes received 31,505<br />
replacements, or “reinforcements” <strong>as</strong><br />
these individual soldiers now were<br />
named. The materiel losses inflicted by<br />
German action represented only a tem-<br />
porary diminution in the fighting<br />
strength of a few of the American divi-<br />
sions and normally were replaced within<br />
a fortnight.<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
What all this cost the Wehrmacht is<br />
impossible to say. It is known that<br />
losses in materiel were very high–and<br />
these no longer could be made good.<br />
The only general indication of German<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties is found in railroad reports<br />
which show that about 67,000 troops<br />
were evacuated from the <strong>Army</strong> Group<br />
B area by rail during December. This<br />
figure, of course, would include some of<br />
the battle c<strong>as</strong>ualties from the earlier<br />
fighting e<strong>as</strong>t of Aachen, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> dis-<br />
e<strong>as</strong>e c<strong>as</strong>es. A number of German division<br />
commanders have made personal esti-<br />
mates of the c<strong>as</strong>ualties suffered by their<br />
own divisions during the l<strong>as</strong>t half of<br />
December, and in the c<strong>as</strong>es of those<br />
formations continually in the line from<br />
16 or 17 December the average is be-<br />
tween two and three thousand “combat<br />
effectives” lost per division. Whatever<br />
the true number of c<strong>as</strong>ualties may have<br />
been on both sides, it is a fair <strong>as</strong>sessment<br />
that over-all, in this particular instance,<br />
the troops on the offensive sustained<br />
heavier losses than those on the<br />
defensive.<br />
Detailed analysis of the ebb and flow<br />
of battle shows that the German armies<br />
in the Ardennes never came close to the<br />
narrow margin between success and fail-<br />
ure. The fortunes of war never were put<br />
in precarious balance <strong>as</strong> they had been<br />
in the spring of 1918, and it is not sur-<br />
prising that General Eisenhower refused<br />
to issue a “Backs to the Wall” order of<br />
the day like that wrung from Haig on<br />
11 April 1918.<br />
Nevertheless, in December 1944 t<strong>here</strong><br />
w<strong>as</strong> an early, emotional Allied reaction<br />
to the first speedy triumphs of the Ger-<br />
man armies which conceived of the at-<br />
tack <strong>as</strong> being another, albeit late,<br />
irruption of the military might which
EPILOGUE 675<br />
had reached out to the Atlantic and the<br />
Cauc<strong>as</strong>us, the Sahara, and the Arctic<br />
Circle. On the other hand, a decade after<br />
the close of World War II, still living<br />
members of the higher German com-<br />
mands would cl<strong>as</strong>sify the Wehrmacht of<br />
late 1944 <strong>as</strong> a “paper tiger.” The history<br />
of the Ardennes Campaign, <strong>as</strong> recounted<br />
in the present volume, shows that<br />
neither one of these extremes w<strong>as</strong> true.<br />
Probably the American war correspond-<br />
ent, Drew Middleton, most closely<br />
approximated the truth when, in the<br />
first days of the Ardennes battle, he<br />
characterized the offensive <strong>as</strong> “the In-<br />
dian summer” of German military<br />
might.<br />
In the long view of history the deci-<br />
sion to attack in the Ardennes represents<br />
only another-and risky-attempt to<br />
solve the old German dilemma of fight-<br />
ing a major war on two fronts, Hitler<br />
deliberately <strong>as</strong>sumed the risk involved in<br />
weakening the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front so that a<br />
powerful blow could be struck in the<br />
west. When, on 14 December, he told<br />
his generals that German industry had<br />
been preparing for the Ardennes offen-<br />
sive for months, he meant this quite<br />
literally. <strong>Of</strong> the total production of ar-<br />
mored fighting vehicles which came out<br />
of German <strong>as</strong>sembly plants in November<br />
and December 1944, the Western Front<br />
received 2,277 while only 919 went to<br />
the E<strong>as</strong>t. As late <strong>as</strong> 5 January 1945 all<br />
the German armies on the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front<br />
possessed only two-thirds the number of<br />
panzers employed in the Ardennes.<br />
Equally important, of course, w<strong>as</strong> Hit-<br />
ler’s decision on 20 November to shift<br />
the Luftwaffe fighter strength to the<br />
Western Front. This diversion of ma-<br />
teriel to the west (which began <strong>as</strong> early<br />
<strong>as</strong> September and included artillery,<br />
Werfers, tractors, machine guns, and<br />
many other items) w<strong>as</strong> accompanied by<br />
a reallocation of military manpower. On<br />
1 December 1944, the total number of<br />
combat effectives under OB WEST com-<br />
mand w<strong>as</strong> 416,713, and one month later<br />
1,322,561 effectives were carried on the<br />
OB WEST rosters. 13<br />
T<strong>here</strong> seems to have been an early<br />
recognition on the part of the higher<br />
German theater commanders that Hit-<br />
ler’s “intuition” had led to a mistaken<br />
choice between operations on the two<br />
major fronts. General Westphal later<br />
alleged that Rundstedt personally ad-<br />
dressed himself to the Fuehrer on 22<br />
December with a plea that the Ardennes<br />
offensive be brought to a halt in order to<br />
reinforce the E<strong>as</strong>tern Front. 14<br />
Guderian, directly charged with oper-<br />
ations against the Russians, used the<br />
occ<strong>as</strong>ion of official visits on Christm<strong>as</strong><br />
Eve and New Year’s Day to petition<br />
Hitler for the movement of troops from<br />
the west to the e<strong>as</strong>t. It is said that at the<br />
end of December, in the Ardennes head-<br />
quarters, “everybody looked with dis-<br />
may to the e<strong>as</strong>t w<strong>here</strong> the big Russian<br />
offensive w<strong>as</strong> about to begin any day.” 15<br />
Hitler stubbornly refused to accede to<br />
all these requests, even after the Allied<br />
counterattack on 3 January began to<br />
collapse the German salient. Inexplic-<br />
ably he waited until 8 January to start<br />
the Sixth Panzer <strong>Army</strong> moving for the<br />
e<strong>as</strong>t-this only four days before the com-<br />
mencement of the Russian winter<br />
offensive.<br />
The proximity in time of the German<br />
Ardennes offensive and the wholesale<br />
13 OKH: Org. Abt. KTB; see also Schramm,<br />
Merkbuch.<br />
14 Heer In Fesseln, p. 283.<br />
15 MS # A-874 (Waldenburg).
676 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
offensive of the Red Armies on 12 Jan-<br />
uary would have untoward results, not<br />
only for the Third Reich, but for the<br />
relations between e<strong>as</strong>t and west in the<br />
postwar era. In February 1945, Stalin<br />
issued an order of the day acclaiming the<br />
recent victories on the Oder front and<br />
bo<strong>as</strong>ting that “The success of this<br />
[Soviet] drive resulted in breaking the<br />
German attack in the West.” Unfortu-<br />
nately, and unwisely, Winston Churchill<br />
opened the door to this and a flood of<br />
similar Russian propaganda claims by<br />
addressing a telegram to Stalin on 6<br />
January 1945, in which he personally<br />
<strong>as</strong>ked for Soviet help by the prompt be-<br />
ginning of a major offensive. Only a few<br />
years later, representatives of the <strong>US</strong>SR<br />
engaged in negotiations on American<br />
claims for the repayment of wartime<br />
shipping loans would allege that these<br />
debts had been canceled when the Rus-<br />
sian armies “saved” the American forces<br />
in the Ardennes. Postwar Russian prop-<br />
aganda in this same vein reached a peak<br />
in a series of articles by Col. N. Nikiforov<br />
alleging that the Soviet attack in Jan-<br />
uary 1945 “averted the danger of the<br />
rout of the Anglo-American armies.” 16<br />
W<strong>as</strong> the risk <strong>as</strong>sumed by Hitler and<br />
his senior military advisers in the Ar-<br />
dennes offensive a valid one? Field Mar-<br />
shals Jodl and Keitel, the artisans but<br />
not the architects of this venture, gave a<br />
joint answer shortly before their execu-<br />
tion: “The criticism whether it would<br />
have been better to have employed our<br />
available reserves in the E<strong>as</strong>t rather than<br />
in the West, we submit to the judgment<br />
of history.” 17<br />
16 The <strong>US</strong>SR Information Bulletin, 12 May 1948,<br />
and Novoye Vremya, No. 18, 18 February 1948.<br />
The most recent of such Soviet claims is that<br />
made by Marshall Grechko in Pravda, 9 May 1960.<br />
17 In answers to a questionnaire submitted by<br />
the Historical Section, <strong>US</strong>FET, on 20 July 1945,<br />
which answers were signed by both Jodl and Keitel.
U.S. <strong>Army</strong><br />
None<br />
General of the <strong>Army</strong><br />
General<br />
Lieutenant General<br />
Major General<br />
Brigadier General<br />
None<br />
Colonel<br />
Lieutenant CoIonel<br />
Major<br />
Captain<br />
Captain (Cavalry)<br />
First Lieutenant<br />
Second Lieutenant<br />
Appendix A<br />
Table of Equivalent Ranks<br />
German <strong>Army</strong> and<br />
Air Force<br />
Reichsmarschall<br />
Generalfeldmarschall<br />
Generaloberst<br />
General der Infanterie<br />
Artillerie<br />
Gebirgstruppen<br />
Kavallerie<br />
Nachrichtentruppen<br />
Panzertruppen<br />
Pioniere<br />
Luftwaffe<br />
Flieger<br />
Fallschirmtruppen<br />
Flakartillerie<br />
Luftnachrichtentruppen<br />
Generalleutnant<br />
Generalmajor<br />
None<br />
Oberst<br />
Oberstleutnant<br />
Major<br />
Hauptmann<br />
Rittmeister<br />
Oberleutnant<br />
Leutnant<br />
German Waffen-SS<br />
None<br />
Reichsfuehrer-SS<br />
Oberstgruppenfuehrer<br />
Obergruppenfuehrer<br />
Gruppenfuehrer<br />
Brigadefuehrer<br />
Oberfuehrer<br />
Standartenfuehrer<br />
Obersturmbannfuehrer<br />
Sturmbannfuehrer<br />
Haupsturmfuehrer<br />
Obersturmfuehrer<br />
Untersturmfuehrer
Appendix B<br />
Recipients of the Distinguished Service Cross<br />
All pertinent <strong>Army</strong> records have been scrutinized in an effort to include<br />
in the following list the names of every soldier who received the DSC for<br />
his part in the operations recounted in this volume. In<strong>as</strong>much <strong>as</strong> no com-<br />
plete listing of DSC awards is maintained in any single <strong>Army</strong> file, it is possi-<br />
ble that some names may inadvertently have been omitted.<br />
Lt. Col. Creighton W. Abrams<br />
Lt. Col. Paul Bandy<br />
Sgt. James L. Bayliss<br />
Sgt. William J. Bennett<br />
Pfc. J. O. Bird<br />
Lt. Col. Barry D. Browne<br />
Sgt. John Bueno<br />
Cpl. Adam F. Burko<br />
Pfc. Angelo Cestoni<br />
Lt. Col. Steve A. Chappuis<br />
Capt. John J. Christy<br />
Capt. A. J. Cissna<br />
Lt. Col. Derrill M. Daniel<br />
Pvt. Albert A. Darago<br />
Sgt. T. J. Dawson<br />
Pfc. Daniel Del Grippo<br />
Pvt. C. W. Dillingham<br />
Sgt. Eddie Dolenc<br />
Capt. Leland R. Dunham<br />
Sgt. B. R. E<strong>as</strong>tburn<br />
Capt. Paul F. Gaynor<br />
Pfc. Jack Gebert<br />
1st Lt. Charles R. Gniot<br />
Capt. John W. Hall<br />
Sgt. Lawrence L. Hatfield<br />
1st Lt. Edgar C. Heist<br />
Lt. Col. John M. Hightower<br />
Pfc. S. E. Hull<br />
2d Lt. Michael Hritsik<br />
1st Lt. G. W. Jackman<br />
Pvt. J. W. Jones<br />
Lt. Col. R. W. Kinney<br />
Capt. Frank Kutak<br />
1st Lt. George D. Lamm<br />
Pfc. O. M. Laughlin<br />
Capt. James H. Leach<br />
Pfc. John Leinen<br />
2d Lt. Samuel Leo<br />
2d Lt. S. D. Llewellyn<br />
Sgt. H. L. Luther<br />
Brig. Gen. Anthony C. McAuliffe<br />
Pfc. W. J. McKenzie<br />
2d Lt. W. D. Markin<br />
Capt. Gabriel R. Martinez<br />
Pfc. A. G. Means<br />
Pfc. Edwin W. Metz<br />
Pvt. Bernard Michin<br />
1st Lt. A. L. Mills<br />
Pfc. Richard Mills<br />
1st Lt. Jesse Morrow<br />
Sgt. Oscar M. Mullins<br />
1st Lt. Kenneth R. Nelson<br />
Pfc. N. A. Osterberg<br />
1st Lt. R. A. Parker<br />
2d Lt. G. F. Pennington<br />
Sgt. T. E. Piersall<br />
Lt. Col. Lemuel E. Pope<br />
Pvt. R. L. Presser<br />
2d Lt. Frederick Rau<br />
Sgt. Woodrow W. Reeves<br />
Sgt. George P. Rimmer<br />
Maj. Gen. Walter M. Robertson<br />
Lt. Col. James C. Rosborough<br />
Pfc. F. S. Rose<br />
Pfc. W. S. Rush<br />
Sgt. I. R. Schwartz<br />
Private Seamon<br />
Sgt. M. N. Shay
APPENDIX B<br />
Pfc. R. D. Smith<br />
Capt. Robert W. Smith<br />
T / Sgt. Russell N. Snoad<br />
Cpl. C. E. Statler<br />
Capt. Vaughn Swift<br />
1st Lt. R. H. Thompson<br />
Lt. Col. Paul V. Tuttle, Jr.<br />
T / Sgt. John Van Der Kamp<br />
Pfc. Gilbert Van Every<br />
Sgt. J. W. Waldron<br />
S / Sgt. William Walsh<br />
2d Lt. R. L. Westbrook<br />
2d Lt. John A. Whitehill<br />
Sgt. William J. Widener<br />
1st Sgt. Gervis Willis<br />
Cpl. Edward S. Withee<br />
Pfc. T. J. Zimmerer<br />
679
Two historically valuable books deal-<br />
ing specifically with the Ardennes Cam-<br />
paign are: Robert E. Merriam’s Dark<br />
December (New York: Ziff-Davis Pub-<br />
lishing Company, 1947) and John <strong>To</strong>-<br />
land’s Battle: The Story of the Bulge<br />
(New York: Random House, 1959).<br />
Merriam’s work subsequently w<strong>as</strong> re-<br />
printed in a paperback edition under<br />
the title The Battle of the Bulge (New<br />
York: Ballantine Books, 1957). These<br />
two interesting and useful books show<br />
quite different approaches to the story.<br />
Merriam, while in the U.S. <strong>Army</strong>, par-<br />
ticipated in the t<strong>as</strong>k of organizing ma-<br />
terials for a future <strong>Army</strong> history of the<br />
Ardennes Campaign and subsequently<br />
made use of these documents in his own<br />
work. <strong>To</strong>land, who wrote his volume on<br />
the b<strong>as</strong>is of extensive interviews with<br />
veterans of the campaign, stresses the<br />
human interest <strong>as</strong>pects of the battle.<br />
T<strong>here</strong> is a surprising dearth of pub-<br />
lished memoir literature from officers in<br />
a position of command during this oper-<br />
ation. In part this lacuna is filled by the<br />
very large body of unit histories com-<br />
piled by the American divisions, regi-<br />
ments, and even battalions, which fought<br />
in the Battle of the Bulge. Extensive<br />
collection of unit histories will be found<br />
in the New York Public Library, the<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Library (W<strong>as</strong>hington, D.C.) , and<br />
the <strong>Of</strong>fice of the Chief of <strong>Military</strong> His-<br />
tory, Department of the <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
The bulk of the American documents<br />
used <strong>as</strong> source material in the present<br />
volume, <strong>as</strong> well <strong>as</strong> microfilm of the<br />
pertinent German documents, are in the<br />
keeping of the National Archives, or in<br />
Bibliographical Note<br />
the <strong>Of</strong>fice of the Chief of <strong>Military</strong> His-<br />
tory. Much of the source material is in<br />
the form of reports made during or after<br />
battle by approximately 1,600 <strong>Army</strong><br />
units in the European Theater of Oper-<br />
ations. The story of this monumental<br />
effort in research and acquisition h<strong>as</strong><br />
been written by Royce L. Thompson,<br />
in his <strong>History</strong> of the Historical Section,<br />
ETO (May 1947), a manuscript in<br />
OCMH files. The American combat<br />
interviews, on which the author h<strong>as</strong><br />
drawn so freely, can be found listed in a<br />
manuscript Catalogue of Combat Inter-<br />
views maintained by OCMH.<br />
Most of the historical manuscripts<br />
prepared by German officers who took<br />
part in the Ardennes Campaign are<br />
catalogued in the Guide to Foreign Mili-<br />
tary Studies, 1945–54, published by<br />
Headquarters, U.S. <strong>Army</strong>, Europe, His-<br />
torical Division, in 1954. Since this<br />
publication, t<strong>here</strong> have been a few addi-<br />
tions to the German manuscript col-<br />
lection and these are catalogued by<br />
OCMH. The history of the early at-<br />
tempts to trace German officers who<br />
served in the Ardennes, transfer them<br />
from prison cells, and elicit their co-<br />
operation <strong>as</strong> historians makes f<strong>as</strong>cinating<br />
reading. Brig. Gen. S. L. A. Marshall<br />
h<strong>as</strong> given a brief sketch of this venture<br />
in his introduction to The Fatal<br />
Decisions, edited by Seymour Freidin<br />
and William Richardson (New York:<br />
William Sloane Associates, 1956) . A full<br />
and dramatic account of the attempt to<br />
obtain German co-operation h<strong>as</strong> been<br />
written by one of the main actors in this<br />
little-known episode, then Maj. Kenneth
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 681<br />
W. Hechler. His manuscript is entitled<br />
The Enemy Side of the Hill: The 1945<br />
Background on the Interrogation of Ger-<br />
man Commanders (Historical Division,<br />
Special Staff, U.S. <strong>Army</strong>, 30 July 1949).<br />
Finally, any student who delves deeply<br />
into the U.S. <strong>Army</strong> operations in western<br />
Europe during World War II must come<br />
inevitably to the Order of Battle of the<br />
United States <strong>Army</strong>, World War II,<br />
European Theater of Operations: Divi-<br />
sions, prepared under the direction of<br />
Capt. Robert J. Greenwald and Chief<br />
Warrant <strong>Of</strong>ficer Meyer M. Cahn in the<br />
<strong>Of</strong>fice of the Theater Historian, ETO<br />
(Paris, 1945).
Glossary<br />
A-2<br />
Intelligence officer or section of an air staff<br />
AAA Antiaircraft artillery<br />
AAR After action report<br />
Abwehr-Schlacht Im West Defensive Battle in the West<br />
AIB<br />
Armored infantry battalion<br />
Anlage Appendix or annex<br />
Ann.<br />
Annex<br />
AT<br />
Antitank<br />
Aufmarschanweisung Revised outline plan<br />
AW<br />
BAR<br />
Bn<br />
CATOR<br />
CCA<br />
CCB<br />
CCR<br />
Ch<strong>as</strong>seurs Ardenais<br />
Christrose<br />
Aircraft warning; automatic weapons<br />
Browning automatic rifle<br />
Battalion<br />
Combined Air Transport Operations Room<br />
Combat Command A<br />
Combat Command B<br />
Combat Command Reserve<br />
Belgian military unit<br />
One of several code names for the Ardennes offensive<br />
CIC<br />
Counter Intelligence Corps<br />
C-in-C<br />
Commander in Chief<br />
GO<br />
Commanding officer<br />
CP<br />
Command post<br />
DAGGER<br />
Ninth <strong>Army</strong> operation intended to clear the Germans<br />
from the west bank of the Roer River once<br />
the dams were destroyed.<br />
Div Division<br />
DSC Distinguished Service Cross<br />
Engr Engineer<br />
Ersatzheer Replacement <strong>Army</strong><br />
ETO<br />
FA<br />
Feldherr<br />
Festung<br />
Feuerwalze<br />
Flak<br />
Fremde Heere Ost<br />
European Theater of Operations<br />
Field Artillery<br />
Great general<br />
Fortress<br />
Rolling barrage<br />
Fliegerabwehrkanone (antiaircraft artillery gun)<br />
OKH Intelligence Section E<strong>as</strong>t<br />
Frontsoldat<br />
Fuehrer Reserve<br />
Fusilier battalion<br />
Front-line fighter<br />
Central officers’ reserve<br />
Separate infantry battalion performing both reconnaissance<br />
and support in German division<br />
F<strong>US</strong>A First United States <strong>Army</strong><br />
G–2<br />
G–3<br />
Intelligence section of divisional or higher staff<br />
Operations section of divisional or higher staff
GLOSSARY 683<br />
G–4 Supply section of divisional or higher staff<br />
Greif German deception operation in support of the Ardennes<br />
counteroffensive<br />
Herbstne bel Autumn Fog (<strong>Army</strong> Group B plan)<br />
I and R Intelligence and Reconnaissance<br />
Inf<br />
Infantry<br />
Interv Interview<br />
Jabo<br />
German slang for jagd-bomber (fighter-bomber)<br />
Jnl Journal<br />
Kampfgruppe German combat group of variable size<br />
K-Tag 12 December<br />
KTB Kriegstagebuch (war diary)<br />
L-Tag 13 December<br />
Martin Code name applied to operations plan drawn up by<br />
OR WEST for Wacht am Rhein for submission<br />
to conference at headquarters <strong>Army</strong> Group B on<br />
27 October 1944<br />
Neb elw erfer Multiple rocket projector<br />
Null Tag D-day (16 December)<br />
Oberquartermeister General staff officer at headquarters of an army (in<br />
charge of supply and administration)<br />
OB WEST Oberbefehlshaber West (Commander in Chief West<br />
or his headquarters)<br />
OKH Oberkommando des Heeres (<strong>Army</strong> High Com-<br />
mand)<br />
OKL Oberkommando der Luftwaffe (Luftwaffe High<br />
Command)<br />
OKW Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (Armed Forces<br />
High Command)<br />
OMAHA Beach Normandy beach <strong>as</strong>saulted by troops of <strong>US</strong>. V<br />
Corps, 6 June 1944<br />
Ord Ordnance<br />
O-Tag D-day (16 December)<br />
Panzerfaust Recoilless German antitank rocket, hand-carried<br />
POL Petrol (g<strong>as</strong>oline), oil, and lubricants<br />
POW Prisoner of war<br />
RCT Regimental combat team<br />
Regts Regiments<br />
Reichsautobahnen The German superhighway system<br />
Reichsbahn German state railroads<br />
S–2 Intelligence officer or section of regimental or lower<br />
staff<br />
S–3 Operations officer or section of regimental or lower<br />
staff<br />
Sec Section<br />
SHAEF Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary Force<br />
SHAPE Supreme Headquarters, Allied Powers, Europe<br />
SS Schutzstaffel (Elite guard)
684<br />
THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
TAC<br />
Tactical Air Command<br />
TC<br />
Troop carrier<br />
TD<br />
Tank destroyer<br />
T/E<br />
T/O&E<br />
TOT<br />
Tables of equipment<br />
Tables of organization and equipment<br />
Time on target, a method of timing artillery fire<br />
from various points to fall on a given target simultaneously<br />
T<strong>US</strong>A Third United States <strong>Army</strong><br />
VHF Very high frequency<br />
V-Leute German agents<br />
Volksdeutsche Citizens of a country other than Germany who were<br />
considered Germans racially<br />
Volkssturm A people’s militia, partially organized in one of the<br />
l<strong>as</strong>t steps of German mobilization for total war<br />
Wacht am Rhein Watch on the Rhine (Ardennes code name)<br />
Waffen-SS A mechanized <strong>Army</strong>-type force originally made up<br />
of volunteers from Nazi party organizations<br />
Wehrmacht<br />
WFSt<br />
German Armed Forces<br />
Wehrmachtfuehrungsstab (Armed Forces Operations<br />
Staff)<br />
Werfer Rocket projector<br />
(-)<br />
Understrength
686 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Size Symbols<br />
The following symbols placed either in boundary lines or<br />
above the rectangle, triangle, or circle inclosing the identifying<br />
arm or service symbol indicate the size of military organization:<br />
EXAMPLES<br />
The letter or number to the left of the symbol indicates the<br />
unit designation; that to the right, the designation of the parent<br />
unit to which it belongs. Letters or numbers above or below<br />
boundary lines designate the units separated by the lines:<br />
Weapons
UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II<br />
The following volumes have been published or are in press:<br />
The War Department<br />
Chief of Staff: Prewar Plans and Preparations<br />
W<strong>as</strong>hington Command Post: The Operations Division<br />
Strategic Planning for Coalition Warfare: 1941-1942<br />
Strategic Planning for Coalition Warfare: 1943-1944<br />
Global Logistics and Strategy: 1940-1943<br />
Global Logistics and Strategy: 1943-1945<br />
The <strong>Army</strong> and Economic Mobilization<br />
The <strong>Army</strong> and Industrial Manpower<br />
The <strong>Army</strong> Ground Forces<br />
The Organization of Ground Combat Troops<br />
The Procurement and Training of Ground Combat Troops<br />
The <strong>Army</strong> Service Forces<br />
The Organization and Role of the <strong>Army</strong> Service Forces<br />
The Western Hemisp<strong>here</strong><br />
The Framework of Hemisp<strong>here</strong> Defense<br />
Guarding the United States and Its Outposts<br />
The War in the Pacific<br />
The Fall of the Philippines<br />
Guadalcanal: The First <strong>Of</strong>fensive<br />
Victory in Papua<br />
CARTWHEEL: The Reduction of Rabaul<br />
Seizure of the Gilberts and Marshalls<br />
Campaign in the Marian<strong>as</strong><br />
The Approach to the Philippines<br />
Leyte: The Return to the Philippines<br />
Triumph in the Philippines<br />
Okinawa: The L<strong>as</strong>t Battle<br />
Strategy and Command: The First Two Years<br />
The Mediterranean Theater of Operations<br />
Northwest Africa: Seizing the Initiative in the West<br />
Sicily and the Surrender of Italy<br />
Salerno to C<strong>as</strong>sino<br />
C<strong>as</strong>sino to the Alps<br />
The European Theater of Operations<br />
Cross-Channel Attack<br />
Breakout and Pursuit<br />
The Lorraine Campaign<br />
The Siegfried Line Campaign<br />
The Ardennes: Battle of the Bulge<br />
The L<strong>as</strong>t <strong>Of</strong>fensive<br />
The Supreme Command
Logistical Support of the Armies, Volume I<br />
Logistical Support of the Armies, Volume II<br />
The Middle E<strong>as</strong>t Theater<br />
The Persian Corridor and Aid to Russia<br />
The China-Burma-India Theater<br />
Stilwell’s Mission to China<br />
Stilwell’s Command Problems<br />
Time Runs Out in CBI<br />
The Technical Services<br />
The Chemical Warfare Service: Organizing for War<br />
The Chemical Warfare Service: From Laboratory to Field<br />
The Chemical Warfare Service: Chemicals in Combat<br />
The Corps of Engineers: Troops and Equipment<br />
The Corps of Engineers: The War Against Japan<br />
The Corps of Engineers: The War Against Germany<br />
The Corps of Engineers: <strong>Military</strong> Construction in the United States<br />
The Medical Department: Hospitalization and Evacuation; Zone of Interior<br />
The Medical Department: Medical Service in the Mediterranean and Minor<br />
Theaters<br />
The Medical Department: Medical Service in the European Theater of Operations<br />
The Ordnance Department: Planning Munitions for War<br />
The Ordnance Department: Procurement and Supply<br />
The Ordnance Department: On Beachhead and Battlefront<br />
The Quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter Corps: Organization, Supply, and Services, Volume I<br />
The Quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter Corps: Organization, Supply, and Services, Volume II<br />
The Quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter Corps: Operations in the War Against Japan<br />
The Quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter Corps: Operations in the War Against Germany<br />
The Signal Corps: The Emergency<br />
The Signal Corps: The Test<br />
The Signal Corps: The Outcome<br />
The Transportation Corps: Responsibilities, Organization, and Operations<br />
The Transportation Corps: Movements, Training, and Supply<br />
The Transportation Corps: Operations Overse<strong>as</strong><br />
Special Studies<br />
Chronology 1941-1945<br />
<strong>Military</strong> Relations Between the United States and Canada: 1939-1945<br />
Rearming the French<br />
Three Battles: Arnaville, Altuzzo, and Schmidt<br />
The Women? <strong>Army</strong> Corps<br />
Civil Affairs: Soldiers Become Governors<br />
Buying Aircraft: Materiel Procurement for the <strong>Army</strong> AirForces<br />
The Employment of Negro Troops<br />
Manhattan: The U,S. <strong>Army</strong> and the Atomic Bomb<br />
Pictorial Record<br />
The War Against Germany and Italy: Mediterranean and Adjacent Are<strong>as</strong><br />
The War Against Germany: Europe and Adjacent Are<strong>as</strong><br />
The War Against Japan
Aachen: 3, 20, 24, 26, 27, 30, 31, 35, 36, 42, 45, 50,<br />
58, 63, 67, 274, 334, 571, 632, 674<br />
Abrams, Lt. Col. Creighton W.: 552–55<br />
Abwehrschlacht im Westen. See Defensive Battle<br />
in the West.<br />
Achêne: 565, 568<br />
Acuff, Maj. John N.: 505<br />
Adams, Col. Andrew J.: 291, 317, 355–57<br />
Afst: 147, 149<br />
Ahr River: 45, 663<br />
Ahr River railroad: 67, 662<br />
Ahrweiler: 660<br />
Air attacks: 4, 5–6, 145, 214, 255–56, 485, 660–63,<br />
665, 667, 672. See also Air support; Air-ground<br />
co-operation; Aircraft; Weather<br />
American-British disagreement on targets: 6, 65<br />
bomb tonnage dropped: 65, 661–63<br />
on bridges: 15, 64–66, 255, 506, 534<br />
against German war production: 4–6, 12, 64–65<br />
on oil production: 65, 612<br />
against Roer River dams: 53<br />
on transportation: 64–67, 255, 660<br />
Air Force, Eighth: 65, 611–12, 661–62<br />
Air Force, Ninth: 240, 268, 377n, 485<br />
Air forces, Allied: 65, 424, 660–61<br />
Air reconnaissance: 17, 51, 61–65, 67, 73, 144, 256,<br />
278, 332, 509<br />
Air superiority: 4, 22, 64–65, 574, 660, 663<br />
Air supply: 95, 172, 387, 407<br />
of B<strong>as</strong>togne garrison: 172, 461, 467, 468, 468n,<br />
470, 475, 526, 554, 609<br />
German: 369, 374<br />
promised to Schnee Eifel forces: 166–67, 171,<br />
171n, 172, 289<br />
Air support: 92, 199–202, 268, 276, 277, 337, 366,<br />
371–72, 376, 419, 470, 474–75, 479, 496, 526, 527,<br />
541, 548, 549, 553, 567, 568, 569, 570, 573, 590,<br />
611–12, 614, 616, 623, 625, 626–27, 634, 638,<br />
649, 660–61, 663<br />
bombing and strafing errors: 376, 377, 377n, 441,<br />
474, 592<br />
German: 19, 22, 37–38, 67, 70, 72, 92–93, 102, 142,<br />
175, 178–79, 332, 475, 476, 478, 546, 632, 660.<br />
See also Luftwaffe.<br />
Air warning net: 374<br />
Air-ground co-operation: 62–63, 128, 172, 569. See<br />
also Air support.<br />
Airborne division, organization and employment:<br />
307–08, 413, 460, 461<br />
Airborne Division, 17th: 305, 334, 556–57, 560,<br />
646–47<br />
Index<br />
Airborne Division, 82d: 73<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 367<br />
command and organization: 306, 343, 344<br />
moves to the Ardennes: 269, 289, 291, 305–07,<br />
315, 316, 334, 336, 339, 342–44, 346–47<br />
operations in the Amblève-Salm sector: 344, 346–<br />
47, 351–52, 359, 365–67, 371, 374, 376, 381, 386,<br />
388, 389–92, 395, 397, 400, 401, 409, 412, 415,<br />
416, 418–21, 443, 580–81, 583–85, 587, 590,<br />
598–601<br />
Airborne Division, 101st: 73<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 451, 453, 455, 461, 481, 609<br />
command and organization: 306–09, 459, 460, 553,<br />
608–09, 617<br />
defense of B<strong>as</strong>togne: 298, 323, 328, 400, 445n, 448,<br />
449–68, 470–75, 477–80, 514, 551, 553–54, 607,<br />
609, 615, 628–30, 644<br />
loss of medical company and supplies: 461, 464,<br />
609<br />
moves to B<strong>as</strong>togne: 289, 303, 305–09, 314–15, 319,<br />
329, 334, 336<br />
Airborne Engineer Battalion, 326th: 462, 472, 480,<br />
555<br />
Airborne operations, German: 269–71, 312, 332, 374<br />
Aircraft. See also Artillery liaison planes.<br />
(C-47’s: 172, 468, 609<br />
fighter-bombers: 61, 92, 202, 268, 332, 337, 424,<br />
471, 475, 479, 496, 527, 534, 548, 549, 569, 584,<br />
597, 614, 616, 625, 626–27, 634, 638, 649, 661,<br />
667<br />
German: 22, 92–93, 271, 332<br />
Marauders: 660<br />
P-38’s: 418, 441, 569–70, 573, 592<br />
P-47’s: 470, 474, 506, 541, 553, 590<br />
P-51’s: 441<br />
P-61’s: 62<br />
Typhoons: 569–70<br />
Aisne River: 353–54, 380, 382–83, 580, 582, 585, 587,<br />
591–95, 601<br />
Akers, Col. R. F.: 566<br />
Albert Canal: 75<br />
Alf valley: 137–38, 154<br />
Allen, Lt. Col. Jack G.: 96–98, 101, 117<br />
Allen, Lt. Col. William H.: 197<br />
Allerborn: 294, 296, 298–99, 304, 445, 452<br />
Alsace: 48, 178, 487, 648, 673<br />
Alzette River: 44, 225–26, 483, 488–89, 510, 516–17<br />
Amberloup: 325, 643<br />
Amblève River: 44, 259–60, 280, 339, 341, 342, 343,<br />
344, 347, 361, 580–81, 604
690 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Amblève River crossings: 265–68, 279, 335–36, 338,<br />
348, 351–52, 359, 363–64, 366–72, 374, 376–77,<br />
578<br />
Ambulances. See Evacuation.<br />
Ammunition: 153, 518, 468, 664, 665. See also Illu-<br />
minating shell; Proximity fuze; Shortages.<br />
Ammunition, German: 22, 37, 68, 72, 663–64, 664n.<br />
See also Shortages.<br />
Ammunition expenditure: 95, 125, 154, 161, 202–21,<br />
224, 232, 283, 338, 470, 496, 539, 577, 630, 647,<br />
658–59, 664<br />
Amonines: 354, 380–81, 383, 386, 582, 585, 587, 593,<br />
613<br />
Andenne: 174–75, 566<br />
Andernach: 668<br />
Andler: 141–42, 148–51, 156, 162, 164, 177<br />
Andromid<strong>as</strong>, T/Sgt. Stephen G.: 596n<br />
Anglo-American relations: 6, 12, 17, 65, 423–24, 610,<br />
671<br />
Antiaircraft: 91, 130, 279, 340, 523, 655, 659<br />
Antiaircraft, German: 50, 65, 67–68, 72, 168, 178–79,<br />
293, 367, 609<br />
Antiaircraft Artillery (Automatic Weapons) Bat-<br />
talions<br />
203d: 278–79, 318, 357, 358, 389<br />
390th: 522–23, 546<br />
440th: 286<br />
447th: 184n, 193, 202, 206, 210, 221<br />
482d: 230, 232, 234, 236, 297<br />
486th: 387<br />
634th: 140, 166<br />
796th: 464<br />
Antiaircraft Artillery Gun Battalions<br />
143d: 339<br />
413th: 113, 149<br />
Antiaircraft guns<br />
37-mm: 317<br />
40-mm Bofors: 193, 202, 210<br />
50-mm: 184n, 197, 202, 210, 221, 234, 297, 402,<br />
645<br />
90-mm: 339, 340, 341<br />
Antitank company: 653<br />
Antitank guns<br />
German: 72, 177, 645<br />
37-mm: 379<br />
57-mm: 126, 220, 653, 654<br />
Antwerp: 2, 16, 17, 19, 19n, 20, 22, 23, 25, 26, 27, 28,<br />
31, 75, 176, 556, 578, 654–55<br />
Ardennes: 39–47, 55–56, 59, 138, 141, 265. See also<br />
Eifel: Road nets: Terrain.<br />
Ardennes counteroffensive<br />
compared with 1940 thrust: 18, 20, 38, 40, 46, 48,<br />
72, 269, 556, 663, 670<br />
compared with World War I: 6. 11, 39–40, 46, 48,<br />
656, 665, 671, 674<br />
the German military “Indian summer”: 675<br />
Arlon: 21, 40, 42–46, 212, 238, 322, 458, 465, 483,<br />
488, 508, 510–12, 514, 520, 523<br />
Arlon-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway: 314–15, 322, 459, 462, 463,<br />
465, 471, 475, 480, 487, 509–11, 524–25, 532, 548,<br />
551, 606, 609, 628<br />
Arloncourt: 629–30, 632<br />
Armed Forces Operations Staff. See Wehrmacht-<br />
fuehrungsstab ( WFSt).<br />
Armor: 125–27, 258, 269, 365–66, 396, 452, 460, 507.<br />
See also Mechanized forces; Tanks.<br />
difficulties on soggy ground: 115, 129, 243, 370,<br />
384, 409, 456<br />
German/<strong>US</strong> division organization and weapons:<br />
365, 651<br />
good going on frozen ground: 47, 416, 553, 649<br />
movement rates: 70–71, 264, 275, 299, 357, 669–<br />
70<br />
opposing tank strengths: 73, 260, 649–50, 652<br />
problems with roads and bridges: 176, 189–90,<br />
250, 265, 267, 268, 364, 373, 590<br />
Armored Division, 2d<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 574<br />
command and organization: 434, 651<br />
operations before the Meuse: 427, 433–36, 439–42,<br />
565–66, 570, 572–74, 574n, 577<br />
Armored Division, 3d: 331, 582n<br />
command and organization: 343, 346, 346n, 353–<br />
54, 387, 427, 585, 651<br />
operations before the B<strong>as</strong>togne-Liège highway:<br />
346, 346n, 347, 352–54, 356, 358, 359, 377–78,<br />
380–91, 397, 406, 420, 431–34, 439, 442, 580–82,<br />
585–89, 591–94, 596–97, 601–02<br />
Armored Division, 4th: 513<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 530<br />
command and organization: 512, 514, 524<br />
operations in the B<strong>as</strong>togne corridor: 457, 458, 462,<br />
467, 472, 480, 486–87, 508, 510–15, 520–21, 523–<br />
32, 535, 547–48, 550n, 551–55, 606–07, 615, 621,<br />
625, 627–28, 636<br />
Armored Division, 5th: 333<br />
Armored Division, 6th: 486, 508, 614<br />
command and organization: 607, 628–29<br />
operations e<strong>as</strong>t of B<strong>as</strong>togne: 627–35, 642<br />
Armored Division, 7th<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 404–05, 412, 421–22<br />
command and organization: 273–74, 280n, 395,<br />
400, 401, 407, 413<br />
defense of the St. Vith perimeter: 285–91, 339,<br />
351, 356, 358, 359, 366, 369, 381, 389, 393, 395–<br />
402, 480<br />
moves south to the St. Vith sector: 158, 265, 266,<br />
274–80, 329, 332–34<br />
operations west of the Salm: 468, 583, 585–87,<br />
589, 591–93, 596–97<br />
withdrawal from St. Vith sector: 392, 405–22<br />
Armored Division, 8th: 334<br />
Armored Division, 9th: 206, 235n<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 160, 232, 234, 235, 258, 298n, 421, 616<br />
command and organization: 225, 228, 230, 235n,<br />
617
INDEX 691<br />
Armored Division, 9th-Continued<br />
defense of B<strong>as</strong>togne: 298n, 450<br />
Sauer River operations: 55, 213, 225–36, 238, 244,<br />
245–46, 248, 252, 255, 256, 257, 483, 496<br />
Armored Division, 10th<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 250, 258, 303, 481<br />
command and organization: 249<br />
moves north to the Ardennes: 206, 208, 244, 249,<br />
314, 331–32, 486<br />
operations on the southern shoulder: 236, 255,<br />
483, 488, 490n, 493–94, 496, 498, 500–501, 508<br />
Armored Division, 11th: 334, 556–57, 612<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 621, 645, 647<br />
command and organization: 560, 617–18<br />
counterattack in B<strong>as</strong>togne sector: 617–18, 620–21,<br />
628–29, 644–47<br />
defense of the Meuse River line: 560, 617<br />
Armored division trains, 7th: 287, 291, 315, 317,<br />
318, 353–56, 356n, 358, 382, 393, 397, 399, 400,<br />
412, 431<br />
Armored Divisions. See Combat Commands.<br />
Armored Engineer Battalion, 9th: 233, 313, 472<br />
Armored Engineer Battalion, 23d: 379<br />
Armored Field Artillery Battalions<br />
3d: 228, 232, 235, 236<br />
16th: 160, 279, 285, 291<br />
54th: 385, 387, 602<br />
58th: 296–97, 297n, 298, 325, 328, 466<br />
62d: 88<br />
73d: 294–97<br />
83d: 385<br />
94th: 552, 554<br />
274th: 550n<br />
275th: 139, 141, 149–50, 279, 283, 287, 291, 402,<br />
418–19<br />
400th: 336, 340<br />
420th: 309, 454, 460, 462, 464, 466, 468, 470, 472,<br />
474<br />
434th: 414<br />
440th: 278, 358, 421<br />
755th: 309<br />
Armored Infantry Battalions<br />
9th: 633–35<br />
10th: 526, 528–29<br />
20th: 300<br />
21st: 620<br />
23d: 282, 283, 404–06, 589–90<br />
27th: 159–60, 285, 410<br />
38th: 283, 403–05<br />
44th: 629–30, 633<br />
48th: 286, 408–09, 589–90<br />
50th: 630, 632–33<br />
51st: 529, 548, 607, 626<br />
52d: 294–95, 298<br />
53d: 530, 552, 554–55<br />
55th: 645<br />
60th: 213, 228–33, 235, 258<br />
63d: 621<br />
Armored Infantry Battalions-Continued<br />
526th: 266–67, 337, 539<br />
Armored Infantry Regiment, 41st: 435<br />
Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, 82d: 568–69<br />
Armored Regiments<br />
33d: 596<br />
66th: 434, 572<br />
67th: 568, 572–73<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, First: 264, 265, 267, 363, 366, 425, 664, 665,<br />
668. See also Hodges, Lt. Gen. Courtney H.<br />
command and organization: 53, 55, 259, 400,<br />
424, 426–27, 512<br />
and defense of St. Vith: 306, 393, 395, 401, 406,<br />
412–13<br />
headquarters command post at Spa: 259, 268–69,<br />
307, 331, 336, 341–42, 343, 349, 393, 424.<br />
headquarters moves from Spa to Chaudfontaine:<br />
344, 424<br />
and counterattack plans for January: 610–12<br />
initial deployment of reinforcements: 266, 274–75,<br />
305, 307, 310, 318, 333, 333n, 334, 376, 423, 427,<br />
556, 557–58<br />
and operations on northwest front: 432, 443,<br />
565–66, 586, 592n, 597, 612, 614<br />
and orders for initial delaying actions: 312, 336,<br />
341, 344, 346, 486, 552<br />
and Schnee Eifel sector battle: 157, 166n, 171,<br />
171n<br />
situation before the counteroffensive: 50, 51, 53,<br />
55, 58, 59, 61, 62, 238, 259, 260, 267<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, Third: 467, 656, 664, 668. See also Patton,<br />
Lt. Gen. George S., Jr.<br />
command and organization: 14, 255, 400, 424,<br />
487–88, 496, 512–13, 560<br />
counterattacks to and beyond B<strong>as</strong>togne: 423–24,<br />
483, 486–88, 490, 496, 508, 509–10, 510n, 512–13,<br />
515–16, 524, 526–27, 532, 534, 539, 605, 606,<br />
606n, 611–15, 617, 627, 647, 672<br />
sends reinforcements to the Ardennes: 244, 249,<br />
315, 327, 332, 333, 457, 465, 482, 486–88, 513,<br />
557, 563<br />
shift toward Luxembourg and Belgium: 255, 306,<br />
480, 488<br />
situation before the counteroffensive: 30, 33, 36,<br />
39, 51, 53, 55, 58, 61, 62, 176, 178, 238, 332, 333,<br />
333n, 334, 485<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, Seventh: 33, 51, 53, 62, 563<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, Ninth: 50, 51, 53, 58, 176, 273, 425. See also<br />
Simpson, Lt. Gen. William H.<br />
placed under 21 <strong>Army</strong> Group control: 424, 427<br />
sends reinforcements to the Ardennes: 158, 269,<br />
274, 275, 305, 308, 317, 332–33, 334, 427, 557<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group, 6th: 53, 424, 487, 611<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group, 12th: 57–59, 61, 73, 74, 172, 255, 512,<br />
655, 664. See also Bradley, Gen. Omar N.<br />
command and organization: 240, 423–25<br />
and reinforcement of the Ardennes: 157, 274,<br />
331–33
692 TH E ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Group, 21: 17, 51, 53, 423–24, 427, 557, 560,<br />
664. See also Montgomery, Field Marshal Sir<br />
Bernard L.<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Groups, German. See German units.<br />
Arnhem: 571<br />
Arsdorf: 521, 544–45<br />
Artillery. See also Artillery support.<br />
counterbattery duel: 629<br />
drum fire: 373<br />
fire by map: 216, 243, 309<br />
fire called on own position: 116, 119, 131, 134n,<br />
185<br />
on friendly troops: 106, 112, 168, 170, 247, 251,<br />
418, 633<br />
marching fire: 251<br />
neutralization of 96, 156, 195, 213, 258<br />
precision ranging: 372<br />
prepared concentrations: 82, 139, 173, 181, 656–57<br />
against tanks and tank concentrations: 654<br />
TOT: 496, 572, 632, 635, 640<br />
types of barrages: 283, 380, 414, 633, 642, 656<br />
Artillery liaison planes: 160, 242, 261, 268, 336, 337,<br />
570, 573, 609, 627, 659<br />
Artillery support: 87–88, 110, 115–16, 119, 124–25,<br />
130–33, 141, 160–61, 202, 209, 234, 239, 242,<br />
245–47, 340, 341, 373–74, 385, 387–88, 441, 494,<br />
496, 501, 508, 515, 554, 597, 629<br />
of the B<strong>as</strong>togne sector: 309, 323, 327–29, 456, 464,<br />
472, 474, 480<br />
German: 19, 37, 68, 71–72, 77, 82, 87, 111, 143,<br />
152, 173, 178, 181, 195–96, 213–16, 226, 229, 231,<br />
247, 258, 404–05, 470, 507, 574<br />
German/<strong>US</strong> comparison: 144–45, 157, 650, 652–53,<br />
656–60<br />
of the St. Vith perimeter: 277, 279, 283, 291, 396,<br />
398–402, 417<br />
Assault guns. See Guns, German, SP.<br />
Assenois: 323, 480, 553–55, 606–07, 615, 619, 623,<br />
626–29<br />
Atrocities: 260n, 261, 261n, 262–64, 364, 520<br />
Attacks<br />
concentric: 142, 349, 381<br />
double envelopment: 20, 26, 27, 29, 31–32, 143<br />
“distracting”: 214<br />
flanking: 92, 220–21, 396<br />
frontal: 92<br />
holding: 29–30, 34<br />
Napoleonic carrè: 26<br />
reconnaissance in force: 282<br />
single envelopment: 142, 525<br />
spoiling: 25, 38, 58, 330, 483, 634<br />
Attert: 43<br />
Attert River: 520<br />
Aubange: 425<br />
Auw: 139, 146, 148–51, 155–56, 163, 164, 166, 169<br />
Auw Bleialf road: 140, 141, 155, 164–65, 169<br />
Auw-Schönberg road: 152, 156, 170<br />
Averill, 1st Lt. Denniston: 358<br />
Aywaille: 341<br />
Baade, Maj. Gen. Paul: 606, 627, 634. See also<br />
Infantry Division, 35th.<br />
Baccarat: 20<br />
Bahe, Maj. Gordon A.: 433, 437<br />
Baillonville: 431, 441, 565<br />
Balkan campaign: 16, 72<br />
Bande: 431, 436<br />
Bandy, Lt. Col. Paul: 518, 518n, 536<br />
BAR. See Browning automatic rifles.<br />
Baraque de Fraiture: 44, 353, 357, 359, 381, 383,<br />
385–86, 388–92, 413, 420, 580–83, 587, 595<br />
Barnes, Lt. Col. Hubert D.: 309<br />
Barr, Lt. Col. Andrew: 354<br />
Barrier lines: 267, 287, 313, 316, 318, 320, 322, 326,<br />
327, 329, 355, 356, 382, 429. See also Corps,<br />
VIII; Roadblocks.<br />
Barton, Maj. Gen. Raymond 0.: 55, 238, 239, 241,<br />
243–45, 248, 2501, 251n, 25 85, 491 –<br />
92, 494, 507, 508. See also Infantry Division,<br />
4th.<br />
B<strong>as</strong>chleiden: 607, 636<br />
B<strong>as</strong>se-Bodeux: 346<br />
B<strong>as</strong>tendorf: 217–18, 221, 223, 226<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne: 19, 22, 28, 40, 612, 615. See also Airborne<br />
Division, 101st.<br />
air attacks: 475, 476, 478, 632, 660<br />
air supply operations: 172, 461, 467, 468, 468n,<br />
470, 475, 526, 554, 609<br />
arrival of the 101st Airborne: 289, 307–09, 314–15,<br />
329, 336<br />
artillery support for the perimeter: 309, 323, 327–<br />
29, 456, 464, 472, 474, 480<br />
close air support of defense operations: 470, 474–<br />
75, 479, 661<br />
command headquarters of VIII Corps: 161, 249,<br />
274, 288, 306, 309, 312, 313, 393, 445<br />
defense of: 435, 438, 440, 445, 445n, 448, 449–68,<br />
470–75, 477–80, 537, 539, 540, 546, 572, 577, 581,<br />
604<br />
delaying actions before: 192, 210, 225, 294–306,<br />
312–21, 359, 398, 445<br />
encirclement of: 323, 458–59, 462<br />
enemy ground attacks: 462, 464–68, 470–80, 563–<br />
64, 574, 601, 613–15, 617–19, 622–23, 631, 637,<br />
644, 647, 657, 670, 673<br />
formation of the defense: 205, 291, 307–09, 317,<br />
319, 329, 357, 423, 448, 449–64<br />
German initial attack plans: 174–77, 183n, 194,<br />
206, 210, 294, 298, 303–05, 356, 443, 449, 452,<br />
454, 475n<br />
link-up with relief forces: 480, 551, 555, 606–07,<br />
613, 672<br />
location and tactical importance of: 44, 45, 46, 47,<br />
306, 312, 459, 509<br />
“relief” counterattack from the south: 509–11,
INDEX 693<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne-Continued<br />
513-15, 519, 523-27, 529-32, 547, 551-55, 563,<br />
605, 607, 611, 617, 627-30<br />
traffic control problems: 309, 458, 615<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne “pocket”: 629<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne-La Roche road: 315, 458<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne-Marche highway: 318, 321, 357, 429, 431-<br />
32, 462, 464, 465, 471, 474, 475-77, 614, 616<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne-Martelange highway: 323, 523, 530, 623,<br />
626<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne-Neufchlteau road: 324, 327, 461, 462, 464,<br />
465, 475, 478, 480, 511, 514, 524, 552-53, 606-07,<br />
614, 615, 617, 628, 644<br />
B<strong>as</strong>togne-St. Hubert highway: 325, 459, 618, 621,<br />
643-44<br />
Batchelder Maj. Clifton B.: 568<br />
Bates, Lt. Col. Oma R.: 243<br />
Battlefield commissions: 84<br />
Battlefield illumination: 89, 128, 655. See also<br />
Illuminating shell; Searchlights.<br />
Bauvenn: 406, 410<br />
Bavigne: 635, 637-38, 641<br />
Bayerlein, Generalleutnant Fritz: 178, 299, 326n,<br />
329, 437-38, 440, 450n, 451, 454, 456, 458, 463,<br />
570, 643<br />
Bayliss, Sgt. James L.: 116n<br />
Bayonets: 97, 115, 128, 210, 463, 549<br />
Bazook<strong>as</strong>: 93, 98, 109, 110, 110n, 115, 117, 126, 127,<br />
130-31, 156, 192, 192n, 220, 224, 234, 243, 247,<br />
250, 254, 273, 281, 323, 328, 340,654<br />
Beaufort: 230-32, 234, 236, 504-05<br />
Beauraing: 433<br />
Bech: 257<br />
Beffe: 381, 383-84<br />
Beho: 279, 286, 398, 413, 415-17<br />
Beiler: 204-05<br />
Belchem, Brig. David: 427<br />
Belfort: 51<br />
Bell, Col. Robert P.: 490<br />
Bell, Col. Virgil: 644<br />
Bennett, S/Sgt. William J.: 209n<br />
Benonchamps: 299, 302, 304, 632<br />
Bercheux: 552<br />
Berdorf: 230, 241-42, 245, 247, 247n, 249, 250, 252-<br />
54, 256, 496-97, 500, 502-04<br />
Berens: 233<br />
Berg: 122, 197<br />
Berle: 640<br />
Berlin: 58<br />
Berry, Capt. James D.: 342<br />
Berterath: 81, 147<br />
Bertogne: 317-20, 356<br />
Bertrix: 618<br />
Berwick, Capt. Lee: 153<br />
Bettborn: 483<br />
Bettel: 217<br />
Bettendorf: 217, 223, 501<br />
Beyer, General der Infanterie Franz: 212, 255-56,<br />
494<br />
Bicycles: 154, 178, 20711, 402, 430<br />
Biddle, Pfc. Melvin: 387<br />
Bielefeld: 58<br />
“Big Solution”: 21, 23, 27-29, 70, 75, 173, 443<br />
Bigelbach: 221, 229-30, 506<br />
Bigonville: 524, 530-32, 544, 552<br />
Billingslea, Col. Charles: 390-91, 581, 590, 595, 597<br />
Bilsdorf: 544<br />
Bird, Pfc. J. O.: 539n<br />
Birkelt Farm: 241, 257, 504<br />
Bissen: 226, 483<br />
Bitburg: 45, 59, 177, 226, 228, 256, 508, 611<br />
Bittrich, General der Waffen-SS Willi: 77, 580-81,<br />
590-91<br />
Bizory: 303-04, 313, 450-51, 454, 456, 629-30<br />
Black, Col. Paul J.: 490, 498-99, 504-05<br />
Blakeley, Brig. Gen. Harold W.: 508<br />
Blanchard, Col. Wendell: 530, 552<br />
Bleialf: 25, 141, 143, 145, 151, 152, 154-55, 163-65,<br />
167, 170<br />
Bleialf-Schonberg road: 165, 167-68, 170<br />
Boats, <strong>as</strong>sault: 180, 183, 216, 229, 241, 504, 546<br />
Bock, Lt. Col. Frank A.: 622<br />
Boggess, 1st Lt. Charles: 554-55<br />
Bois de Chardonne: 442<br />
Bois de Famenne: 569<br />
Bois de Fragotte: 616, 619, 621<br />
Bois de Geauvelant: 568-70<br />
Bois de Herbaimont: 614<br />
Bois des Haies de Magery: 618, 621, 644<br />
Bois des Valets: 620, 644, 646<br />
Bois Jacques: 629<br />
Boisselles: 568<br />
Bolden, S/Sgt. Paul: 375<br />
Bollendorf: 55, 215, 229, 235, 236, 240, 495, 506<br />
Bolling, Brig. Gen. Alexander R.: 427-28, 430-33,<br />
438, 442, 574. See also Infantry Division, 84th.<br />
Bombardment Division, IX: 377n, 661-62<br />
Bombardment Group, 391st: 660<br />
Bombardment Group, 406th: 661<br />
Bombing. See Air attacks; Air support.<br />
Bone, Sgt. Otis: 110<br />
Bonn: 45, 50, 51, 64, 69, 140, 595, 613, 665<br />
Bonn-Euskirchen railroad: 67<br />
Bonnal: 544-47, 638<br />
Bonnerue: 644<br />
Bonney, Capt. George E.: 436<br />
Boos, Col. Francis H.: 115-16, 122<br />
Booth, Lt. Col. Robert M.: 298, 448<br />
Borgoumont: 348<br />
Born: 151, 163, 281, 396<br />
Bottomly, Maj. Raymond V., Jr.: 450<br />
Boudinot, Brig. Gen. Truman E.: 348, 376<br />
Bouillon: 326, 560<br />
Boulaide: 607<br />
Bourcy: 299, 629, 631, 633
694 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Bourcy-B<strong>as</strong>togne railroad: 456, 462, 463<br />
Bourcy-Noville road: 299, 304<br />
Bourdon: 438, 442, 574<br />
Bourscheid: 215, 517, 519–21, 535–39, 546<br />
Bourscheid triangle: 532, 539<br />
Bovigny: 267, 413, 418–20<br />
Boxtel: 557<br />
Boyer, Maj. Donald P., Jr.: 273n<br />
Boylan, Lt. Col. Vincent L.: 409, 417<br />
Bradley, Gen. Omar N.: 53, 55, 56, 225, 307, 316<br />
Allied counterattack plans: 509, 512, 610–12, 615,<br />
617<br />
and division of command with Montgomery: 423–<br />
24, 426<br />
and movement of reinforcements to Ardennes:<br />
305–07, 331–34, 486–87, 510, 513<br />
Brandenberger, General der Panzertruppen Erich:<br />
26, 75, 212–13, 226, 232, 236, 240, 465, 495, 533–<br />
34, 538–41, 545, 642–43<br />
Brandenburg: 214, 217, 220<br />
Br<strong>as</strong>: 346, 590, 621, 631<br />
Br<strong>as</strong>-B<strong>as</strong>togne road: 299, 623, 629<br />
Braunlauf: 415–16<br />
Braunlauf Creek: 272, 285, 406, 410, 414–15<br />
Breitweiler: 245, 249, 458<br />
Bremen: 67<br />
Brewster, Maj. Olin F.: 392, 584, 589–90<br />
Bridges: 66, 92, 325. See also Bridging operations;<br />
Engineers; and river crossings by name of<br />
river.<br />
air and artillery attacks on: 15, 64–66, 255, 506,<br />
534, 660–63<br />
Bailey: 318–20, 526, 546–47, 638<br />
cl<strong>as</strong>s 70 two-way: 378<br />
destroyed: 83, 208, 224, 226, 244, 252, 260, 268,<br />
284, 317, 318, 320, 322, 338, 343, 351, 356, 363,<br />
371, 373, 419, 420, 501, 518, 525, 544, 546–47,<br />
552, 560, 585<br />
failure to destroy: 206, 207, 266, 320–21, 419<br />
footbridges: 348, 378, 379<br />
German GO-ton: 178, 186, 187<br />
portable infantry: 216<br />
unsuitable for heavy traffic: 268, 343, 370<br />
Bridging operations: 66, 183–84, 186, 198, 221–22,<br />
232, 235, 245, 253, 260, 292, 321, 357, 370, 377,<br />
506, 669<br />
Briscol: 601<br />
British units. See also <strong>Army</strong> Group, 21; Phantom;<br />
Royal Air Force.<br />
Armored Brigade, 29th: 433, 443, 557, 561, 568–<br />
69, 572<br />
<strong>Army</strong>, Second: 53<br />
Corps, 30: 176, 426, 557, 561<br />
Division, 6th Airborne: 557<br />
Division, 43d: 557, 561<br />
Division, 50th: 647<br />
Division, 51st: 443, 557<br />
Division, 53d: 557, 574, 577<br />
British units-Continued<br />
Division, Guards Armoured: 557<br />
Regiment, 2d Household Cavalry: 561<br />
Regiment, 3d Royal Tank: 569<br />
Yeomanry, Fife and Fofar: 574<br />
Britton, Lt. Col. Frank K.: 633, 635<br />
Brown, Lt. Col. Charles E.: 629–30, 633<br />
Browne, Lt. Col. Barry D.: 462, 464, 466–67, 472,<br />
473, 473n<br />
Browning automatic rifles: 141<br />
Brul: 620, 644, 646<br />
Brussels: 22, 28, 39, 75, 176, 557, 612<br />
Buchet: 166, 171<br />
Buchholz: 80–81, 84, 90, 94, 182, 184, 186–88<br />
Buchholz Forest: 54<br />
Buderscheid: 639–41<br />
Bueno, Sgt. John: 372n<br />
Buildings, attack and defense of: 190–92, 241–42,<br />
247, 250–51, 256, 303, 324, 349–51, 365<br />
Buissonville: 434–36, 438, 440–41, 565, 570–72<br />
Buhle, Walter: 12<br />
Bulgarian forces: 2<br />
Büllingen: 91–92, 94, 99, 104–05, 108, 111, 113,<br />
128–31, 133, 261<br />
Büllingen-Malmédy road: 80–81, 83, 90, 91, 112–<br />
13, 120, 128<br />
Büllingen–St. Vith road: 163, 403<br />
Burden ridge: 537<br />
Burg Reuland: 160, 195, 196, 272, 279<br />
Burko, Cpl. Adam F.: 372n<br />
Burnenville: 363<br />
Burnon: 526<br />
Burns, Capt. J. H.: 184<br />
Butgenbach: 25, 81, 87, 91, 105, 112, 113, 121–22,<br />
128–30, 134, 332, 603–04, 667<br />
Butler, Lt. Col. McClernand: 87, 119<br />
Buttlar-Brandenfels, Generalmajor Horst Freiherr<br />
Treusch von: 27, 28<br />
Byrne, Col. Bernard A.: 607, 637<br />
“C” Route: 81, 83, 90, 91<br />
Callanan, Lt. Col. W. A.: 544<br />
Camouflage: 50, 67, 70, 87, 144, 470, 478, 499, 505,<br />
633<br />
Camp Elsenborn: 54, 110, 113, 271, 331<br />
Camp Mourmelon: 73, 309<br />
Canadian forces: 17, 19, 611<br />
Canadian Forestry Company, 9th: 318, 318n, 321,<br />
356<br />
Canal Defense Lights: 655<br />
Cannon, Maj. Charles A., Jr.: 276<br />
Cannon company: 653<br />
Carnes, Lt. Col. Norman D.: 433<br />
Carpenter, Lt. Leonard R.: 439<br />
Carr, 1st Lt. Walter P.: 551 .<br />
C<strong>as</strong>ualties: 116, 125, 273, 530, 549, 593, 656. See<br />
also Evacuation; Losses, summary of.<br />
civilian: 262, 364, 376, 377
INDEX 695<br />
C<strong>as</strong>ualties-Continued<br />
German: 37, 89, 97, 120, 127, 132, 147, 184n,<br />
203, 211, 221, 244, 247, 252, 258, 361, 506–07,<br />
570, 595, 615, 668, 674<br />
nonbattle: 123–24, 141, 238, 495, 503, 507, 607<br />
officers: 104, 129, 154, 168, 220, 253, 351, 367, 410,<br />
451, 548, 594<br />
CATOR. See Combined Air Transport Operations<br />
Room (SHAEF) .<br />
Cavalry Groups<br />
2d: 494, 496, 499<br />
4th: 436, 441, 570–72, 574<br />
14th: 55, 80, 81, 85, 90, 136, 136n, 137–41, 144–51,<br />
156, 161–64, 279, 281, 288, 330, 397, 422<br />
102d: 330<br />
Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadrons<br />
4th: 441<br />
6th: 606, 636<br />
18th: 138–39, 145–49, 149n, 150–51, 154, 162, 163,<br />
165–66, 281<br />
24th: 441, 570–71<br />
25th: 525<br />
28th: 621<br />
32d: 91, 139, 148, 150, 162–64, 273, 277, 281<br />
38th: 79, 87–88, 102<br />
41st: 621<br />
87th: 276, 279, 282–83, 358–59, 389, 397, 403–05,<br />
409<br />
89th: 230–32, 234, 273, 284–85, 403n<br />
90th: 236, 300, 501<br />
Cavender, Col. Charles C.: 138, 154, 166–68, 171<br />
Celles: 441, 565, 568–72, 574, 591, 612, 672<br />
Cestoni, Pfc. Angelo: 98n<br />
Chamberlain, Lt. Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> C.: 249<br />
Champlon crossroads: 429, 436<br />
Champs: 462, 474, 476–79, 645<br />
Chance, Col. Robert H.: 238, 243–44, 254, 257<br />
Chapman, Maj. Cecil: 643<br />
Chappuis, Lt. Col. Steve A.: 307, 479, 479n<br />
Charles XII (Sweden) : 10<br />
Charleville: 212, 560<br />
Chaudfontaine: 344, 427<br />
Chaumont: 526–29, 529n, 530–31, 548–49, 551<br />
Chemical Mortar Battalion, 87th: 602<br />
Chemical Mortar Battalion, 91st: 503<br />
Cheneux: 268, 348, 351–52, 366–67, 599<br />
Chenogne: 325, 616, 619–21, 644–46<br />
Chérain: 395, 397–98, 400<br />
Cherry, Lt. Col. Henry T.: 296, 300–303, 448, 449,<br />
450–51<br />
Cheston, Lt. Col. Elliott B.: 518<br />
Chevron: 268, 343<br />
Chiers River: 560<br />
Chifontaine: 299<br />
Christnach: 230, 236, 483, 494, 498–99<br />
Christrose: 176<br />
Christy, Capt. John J.: 638n<br />
Churchill, Winston: 676<br />
Ciergnon: 569<br />
Cierreux: 418–21<br />
Ciney: 434–35, 440–41, 565, 567–68, 587<br />
Cissna, Capt. A. J.: 544<br />
Civilians: 4, 6, 226, 254, 262, 364, 370, 372, 376, 377<br />
Clarke, Brig. Gen. Bruce: 275–76, 282, 290, 405–07,<br />
409–10, 412, 414, 416–17<br />
Clausewitz: 11<br />
Clay, Lt. Col. Roy Udell: 139, 279<br />
Clerf: 174, 179, 181–85, 187–92, 205, 206, 294–96<br />
Clerf River: 44, 331<br />
Clerf River crossings: 176–79, 181, 185–92, 205–07,<br />
222, 294, 298, 312–13<br />
Clerf-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway: 179–81, 183, 183n, 187–88,<br />
189–90, 206, 210, 312–13, 315, 628<br />
Clochimont: 470, 553, 629<br />
Cobreville: 552–53<br />
Cochenhausen, Major von: 567, 569–70<br />
Cohen, Lt. Col. Harold: 528<br />
Colbet: 246, 497<br />
Collier, Brig. Gen. John: 434–36, 440–41, 571–73<br />
Collins, Maj. Gen. J. Lawton: 385, 387, 427, 431–34,<br />
565–66, 566n, 568, 587, 587n, 591, 597, 611–12.<br />
See also Corps, VII.<br />
Collins, Lt. Col. Kenneth W.: 228, 230, 235, 615<br />
Colmar: 51, 611<br />
Cologne: 27, 36, 42, 45, 50, 51, 58–59, 65, 69, 74<br />
Cologne-Düren railroad: 67<br />
Combat Commands of Armored Divisions<br />
CCA, 2d Armored Division: 434–36, 440–41, 570–<br />
72<br />
CCB, 2d Armored Division: 441, 443, 567–70, 572<br />
CCR, 2d Armored Division: 572–73<br />
CCA, 3d Armored Division: 346, 352, 381–82, 384,<br />
385, 433, 585, 594, 601<br />
CCB, 3d Armored Division: 346–49, 352, 359,<br />
374, 376–77, 385, 582n, 592<br />
CCR, 3d Armored Division: 353, 377–79, 381,<br />
382, 384, 386–88<br />
CCA, 4th Armored Division: 524–26, 529–31, 548–<br />
51, 607, 609, 624–26<br />
CCB, 4th Armored Division: 457, 512–14, 525–29,<br />
531, 548–54, 607, 626<br />
CCR, 4th Armored Division: 530–32, 544, 552–55,<br />
607<br />
CCR, 5th Armored Division: 431<br />
CCA, 6th Armored Division: 607, 628–30, 632<br />
CCB, 6th Armored Division: 628–30, 632, 644<br />
CCR, 6th Armored Division: 631–32<br />
CCA, 7th Armored Division: 279, 286, 290, 408–<br />
09, 417–19, 585–89, 589n, 590, 593<br />
CCB, 7th Armored Division: 158, 275, 279, 282,<br />
285, 287, 290–91, 396, 403–06, 408–10, 412, 414–<br />
18, 593<br />
CCR, 7th Armored Division: 274, 278–82, 286,<br />
290, 418–19<br />
CCA, 9th Armored Division: 225, 230, 233–35,<br />
488, 494, 500, 508, 607, 615–17, 645–46
696 THE A RDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Combat Commands of Armored Divisions–<br />
Continued<br />
CCB, 9th Armored Division: 157–60, 228, 265,<br />
273, 275, 279, 282, 284–85, 290–92, 331, 392, 393,<br />
395–97, 400, 403, 405–06, 410, 412–16, 418, 421,<br />
583, 587, 589<br />
CCR, 9th Armored Division: 157, 190, 199, 206,<br />
294–304, 311, 313, 315, 316, 331, 448, 460, 464,<br />
473<br />
CCX, 9th Armored Division: 500–501<br />
CCA, 10th Armored Division: 249–52, 254–55,<br />
256–57<br />
CCB, 10th Armored Division: 300, 303, 309, 315,<br />
448, 448n, 449, 451–52, 454, 457, 459–61, 463–64,<br />
467, 468, 472–75, 481, 488, 513–14, 632<br />
CCA, 11th Armored Division: 617–18, 621, 644,<br />
646<br />
CCB, 11th Armored Division: 617–18, 620–21,<br />
644–47<br />
CCR, 11th Armored Division: 644–45<br />
Combat teams. See T<strong>as</strong>k Forces; Teams.<br />
Combined Air Transport Operations Room<br />
(SHAEF) : 171–72<br />
Command. See also Tactical control.<br />
air resupply co-ordination problems: 171–72<br />
in the B<strong>as</strong>togne sector: 460, 464, 475<br />
Bradley-Montgomery split of forces: 423–26<br />
confusing and contradictory orders: 117–18, 161,<br />
163–64, 167, 205, 336, 392, 424, 489–90, 490n,<br />
512, 513–15, 587, 630<br />
decision left to “man on the ground”: 28, 161,<br />
162, 166, 225, 289, 420, 452, 671<br />
initial reactions to German attack: 80, 272, 311–<br />
12, 330–33, 333n, 334–35<br />
in the St. Vith perimeter: 288–91, 395, 401, 403,<br />
406–07, 412–13<br />
Commando operations. See Greif (Operation) .<br />
Commanster: 413, 416–17<br />
Communications: 124–25, 249, 401, 424–25, 461–62,<br />
625. See also Radios; Telephone communica-<br />
tions.<br />
German: 231, 240, 252, 269, 322, 337, 368<br />
jamming: 391, 654<br />
problems of: 117–18, 132, 158, 165, 167, 193,<br />
204–06, 240–41, 242–43, 251n, 254, 280, 289,<br />
298, 311–12, 331, 393, 395n, 405, 420, 554, 587,<br />
592, 630, 654, 658<br />
Communications Zone: 172, 305, 557, 559–60<br />
Condor. See Greif (Operation)<br />
Condroz: 42<br />
Congressional Medal of Honor. See Medal of Honor.<br />
Coningham, Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur: 424<br />
Conjoux: 440–41, 568–70<br />
Connaughton, Maj. George W.: 548<br />
Conneaux: 567<br />
Connor, Lt. Col. Robert E.: 497<br />
Consdorf: 231, 243, 245–47, 249, 254, 257, 313, 484<br />
Consthum: 181–82, 185–86, 192–93, 205–06<br />
Cook, Lt. Col. Julian A.: 367<br />
Corps, III: 327, 489–90. See also Millikin, Maj. Gen.<br />
John<br />
command and organization: 487–88, 508, 510,<br />
512, 514, 539<br />
counterattack toward B<strong>as</strong>togne and St. Vith: 487,<br />
510–16, 519–20, 523–26, 532–33, 541–42, 543n,<br />
544, 547, 607, 609, 612, 614, 627–28, 634–35, 637<br />
Corps, V. See also Gerow, Maj. Gen. Leonard T.<br />
command and organization: 53–55, 120, 134, 228,<br />
331, 343<br />
holds the salient north shoulder: 80, 86, 91, 103–<br />
04, 113, 120, 134, 137, 161, 306, 316, 330–32,<br />
335, 337, 345, 426, 431, 443, 580, 603–04, 656<br />
situation before the counteroffensive: 53, 59, 77–<br />
80, 95, 140<br />
Corps, VII: 53, 55, 86, 113, 238, 611–12. See also<br />
Collins, Maj. Gen. J. Lawton.<br />
command and organization: 387, 411n<br />
operations west of the Ourthe: 385, 387, 427–28,<br />
431–34, 436, 438, 441–43, 565–66, 572, 577, 580,<br />
585, 587, 591, 592n, 597, 603<br />
Corps, VIII. See also Middleton, Maj. Gen. Troy H.<br />
command and organization: 55–56, 255, 288, 315,<br />
400, 457, 487, 512–14, 560, 612, 617<br />
counterattack northe<strong>as</strong>t in the B<strong>as</strong>togne sector:<br />
612, 615–18, 621, 627–28, 643, 647<br />
and defense of B<strong>as</strong>togne: 457, 459, 460–62, 464,<br />
466, 472, 474–75, 511, 512, 514<br />
and defense of St. Vith sector: 273, 275, 289,<br />
393, 395<br />
delaying actions before B<strong>as</strong>togne: 206, 210n, 254,<br />
294–95, 307, 329, 346, 359, 377, 400, 513<br />
initial attacks all along the front: 104, 157–58,<br />
161, 163, 184, 187, 274, 305–07, 330–33, 335,<br />
345, 486, 488, 557, 657–58<br />
operations on the southern shoulder: 226, 255,<br />
428, 508, 512–13, 524, 560–61, 607<br />
preparation of barrier lines: 287, 310–15, 318–19,<br />
322–23, 326–27, 359, 423, 429, 523, 525, 532, 552<br />
and the Schnee Eifel sector battle: 161, 170–71,<br />
289<br />
situation before the German attack: 54–56, 59–<br />
63, 73, 78, 137, 139–41, 227–28, 238, 310, 556<br />
Corps, XII. See also Eddy, Maj. Gen. Manton S.<br />
command and organization: 485–86, 488, 539<br />
operations in the Sauer River sector: 488–89,<br />
490, 493–94, 496, 501, 507–08, 515, 535, 539, 613,<br />
614, 627–28, 637, 666<br />
Corps, XIII: 273, 274, 333<br />
Corps, XV: 37, 488<br />
Corps, XVIII (Airborne) : 305, 612. See also Ridg-<br />
way, Maj. Gen. Matthew B.<br />
command and organization: 336, 342–44, 427<br />
operations on First <strong>Army</strong> northwest front: 344–<br />
46, 346n, 351, 352–54, 356n, 357, 359, 366,<br />
371, 376, 382, 385, 387, 389, 393, 395, 400–<br />
401, 406–07, 411, 413, 422, 426, 427, 428, 431–<br />
33, 566, 579–81, 583, 585–87, 589n, 590, 592n,<br />
598–99, 603
INDEX 697<br />
Corps, XIX: 334, 433<br />
Corps, XX: 487–89, 493, 496, 508<br />
Corps, provisional (Third <strong>Army</strong>) : 255<br />
Cota, Maj. Gen. Norman D.: 55, 180, 182, 184, 187–<br />
88, 190, 193, 199, 202, 203–06, 208, 210, 217–19,<br />
225, 323–24, 327–28, 457–58, 460. See also In-<br />
fantry Division, 28th.<br />
Counter Intelligence Corps: 240<br />
Courbiere, Major von: 638<br />
Cowan, Pfc. Richard E.: 99n<br />
Craig, Lt. Col. William: 167n<br />
Crete: 270<br />
Croatian forces: 2<br />
Crombach: 407, 409, 414–16<br />
Crossroads, tactical importance of: 43, 388, 511<br />
Culin, Brig. Gen. Frank L., Jr.: 618, 643<br />
Cureton, Capt R. W.: 219<br />
Currey, Pfc. Francis: 362<br />
Custinne: 569–70<br />
“D” Route: 81, 83, 91<br />
Dager, Brig. Gen. Holmes E.: 512, 514, 525–26, 553,<br />
626<br />
DAGGER (Operation) : 273<br />
Dalessandro, Sgt. Peter J.: 134n<br />
Danahy, Lt. Col. Paul A.: 468<br />
Daniel, Lt. Col. Derrill M.: 113, 129, 132, 132n, 133<br />
Darago, Pvt. Albert A.: 340<br />
D<strong>as</strong>burg: 34, 174, 178–79, 183–84, 186–87, 198,<br />
204<br />
Daun: 45, 293<br />
Davall, Lt. Col. Harold C.: 630, 633<br />
Davidson, Lt. Col. Henry E., Jr.: 243<br />
Dawson, Sgt. T. J.: 616n<br />
Deception: 27, 50, 64, 67, 70, 73, 91, 98, III, 151–52,<br />
184m, 203, 228, 269–71, 361, 363, 379, 406, 489,<br />
551, 558–59, 561, 571, 588–89. See also Cam-<br />
ouflage; Surprise.<br />
Decker, Generalleutnant Karl: 614<br />
Deckert, Colonel: 476–77<br />
Defense. See also Barrier lines; Obstacles.<br />
blocking position: 107, 115, 175, 212, 229, 248, 369<br />
in depth: I28<br />
linear: 139, 141, 239, 311<br />
perimeter: 165, 166, 193, 336, 380, 390, 409, 418<br />
“scratch forces”: 92, 97, 185, 202, 206, 221, 246,<br />
282, 286–87, 310, 314–15, 322–23, 328, 356, 392,<br />
397, 398, 460, 464, 513, 607<br />
screening operations: 235, 236, 311, 327, 432–33<br />
Defensive Battle in the West: 21, 26, 33, 49<br />
Deifeld: 397–98<br />
Del Grippo, Pfc. Daniel: 367<br />
Dellen: 523, 540<br />
Dellert, Lt. CoI. Howard C.: 543<br />
Demolitions: 235, 250, 253, 254, 256, 316, 318–21,<br />
322, 326, 329, 356, 669<br />
Dempwolff, Col. Hugo: 235–36, 501, 566<br />
Denkert, Generalmajor Walter: 619, 646<br />
Descheneaux, Col. George L., Jr.: 138, 156, 167–68,<br />
171<br />
Deserters: 51, 60<br />
Desobry, Maj. William R.: 449, 452, 454<br />
Devers, Lt. Gen. Jacob L.: 53, 424, 487, 611<br />
Devine, Col. Mark: 136n, 137–39, 147–48, 150–51,<br />
162–63, 281<br />
Dickweiler: 241–45, 248, 251–52, 254, 257, 488<br />
Diekirch: 21, 43, 214, 216–19, 221, 223–27, 234–36,<br />
312–13, 487, 501, 516<br />
Dietrich, Generaloberst der Waffen–SS Josef “Sepp”:<br />
26, 31, 34, 75–77, 112, 120, 121, 262, 270, 435,<br />
444, 578–79, 598, 603<br />
Dillingen: 230, 495, 501, 505–46<br />
Dillingham, Pvt. C. W.: 574n<br />
Dinant: 42, 44, 75, 428, 433–35, 437–38, 440–41, 557,<br />
561, 564, 566–67, 574<br />
Distinguished Service Cross: 85n, 94n, 98n, 101n,<br />
107n, 111, 116n, 117n, 119n, 132n, 149n, 155n,<br />
167n, 198n, 209q 218n, 221, 225n, 234, 234n,<br />
247n, 285n, 300n, 319n, 340, 350, 362, 366, 367,<br />
372n, 375, 419n, 439, 455n, 460n, 471n, 473n,<br />
479n, 485n, 518n, 521n, 523, 529, 538n, 539, 539n,<br />
543, 544, 550, 550n, 555, 573, 574, 574n, 596n,<br />
616n, 630n, 636n, 638n, 640n<br />
Distinguished Unit Citation: 93n, 100, 119n, 125n,<br />
268n, 318n<br />
Divisions. See Airborne Divisions; Armored Divi-<br />
sions; British units; German units; Infantry<br />
Divisions.<br />
Doan, Lt. Col. Leander L.: 582n<br />
Dochamps: 353–54, 358–59, 377, 380–86, 389–90<br />
Dolenc, Sgt. Eddie: 85, 85n<br />
Dom Butgenbach: 113, 128, 130–33<br />
Donnange: 179, 187, 192<br />
Doster Farm: 497, 502<br />
Dougl<strong>as</strong>, Lt. Col. Robert H.: 85<br />
Drauffelt: 181, 186, 207<br />
Duffner, Col. Carl F.: 594<br />
Duggan, Lt. Col. Augustine: 281–82<br />
Dunham, Capt. Leland R.: 638n<br />
Dupuis, Capt. Paul H.: 251, 251n<br />
Dupuy, Col. R. Ernest: 136n<br />
Durbuy: 318, 581, 591<br />
Duren: 26, 42, 58, 62, 433<br />
Dusseldorf: 58, 64<br />
Dwight, Capt. William: 554–55<br />
Earnest, Brig. Gen. Herbert L.: 524–25, 529, 609, 626<br />
E<strong>as</strong>tburn, Sgt. B. R.: 640n<br />
E<strong>as</strong>tern Front: 72, 173, 195, 239, 263, 293, 675. See<br />
also Soviet offensives.<br />
Echternach: 19, 44, 212, 213, 228, 240–43, 245, 247–<br />
51, 253–54, 256–57, 332, 482–83, 490, 492, 494,<br />
496–97, 500, 503–04<br />
Echternach-Luxembourg road: 242, 249, 484, 491<br />
Eddy, Maj. Gen. Manton S.: 485–86, 488, 490–92,<br />
496, 503, 506, 508. See also XII Corps.<br />
Edingen: 242, 253
698 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Eibertingen: 81<br />
Eifel: 20, 39–40, 42–48, 50–51, 62, 64–65, 69, 74,<br />
137, 141, 177, 178, 649. See also Schnee Eifel.<br />
Eigelscheid: 152–53<br />
Eisenborn: 257<br />
Eisenhower, Gen. Dwight D.: 58, 412, 674. See also<br />
Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary<br />
Forces (SHAEF) .<br />
and Bradley-Montgomery command arrange-<br />
ment: 424, 426<br />
conferences with top commanders: 51, 53, 332,<br />
486–88, 509–10, 611, 612<br />
and constraints on General Patton: 485, 509<br />
and differences with Montgomery on future strat-<br />
egy: 53, 333<br />
and possibility of German counteroffensive: 56<br />
and reinforcements and the SHAEF Reserve:<br />
305–06, 332–34, 556<br />
and rumored German plan for capture of: 270,<br />
558<br />
and Third <strong>Army</strong> counterattack: 423, 509, 512,<br />
515, 610–12, 617<br />
Ekman, Col. William E.: 351n, 352, 370–71, 581,<br />
599–600<br />
Elcherath: 159–60<br />
Elsenborn: 77, 86, 104–07, 109, 112, 117–18, 120,<br />
122, 126, 128, 270, 580<br />
Elsenborn ridge: 96, 103–04, 109, 112, 113, 115,<br />
120, 122, 125, 133, 134, 374, 578–80, 603–04,<br />
611, 658<br />
Elverfeldt, Brig. Gen.: 571<br />
Engeman, Maj. Leonard E.: 283<br />
Engineer B<strong>as</strong>e Depot Company, 724th: 325<br />
Engineer Combat Battalions<br />
1st: 133<br />
2d: 94<br />
4th: 244–45<br />
35th: 313, 315, 325–26, 456–57, 462<br />
44th: 206–10, 313<br />
51st: 267–68, 268n, 318, 318n, 351, 355, 378, 379,<br />
429–31, 436<br />
81st: 151, 155, 165–66, 273, 403–05<br />
103d: 181–82, 192, 218<br />
105th: 372n<br />
158th: 299, 313, 315, 319, 319n, 321, 325, 355–56,<br />
429, 450–51<br />
159th: 243, 250, 313, 484, 492<br />
168th: 273, 275, 277, 279, 283, 312, 331, 403<br />
178th: 515<br />
202d: 266<br />
249th: 544<br />
254th: 91, 94<br />
291st: 263, 265, 268, 359<br />
299th: 312, 313, 315, 319, 322<br />
309th: 437<br />
324th: 101, 112<br />
1278th: 315, 318–19<br />
Engineer Combat Groups<br />
1102d: 271n, 314<br />
Engineer Combat Groups-Continued<br />
1107th: 271n<br />
1111th: 267<br />
1128th: 271n, 310, 312–13, 317<br />
Engineer General Service Regiments:<br />
341st: 332<br />
342d: 560<br />
354th: 559<br />
366th: 560<br />
392d: 560<br />
1308th: 560<br />
1313th: 559<br />
Engineer Light Equipment Company, 626th: 313<br />
Engineer Light Ponton Company, 527th: 327<br />
Engineers: 123, 186, 267, 310, 327, 329, 329n, 351,<br />
351n, 380, 545, 649. See also Barrier lines;<br />
Bridging.<br />
Epinal: 20<br />
Eppeldorf: 232, 235, 500–501<br />
Erezée: 378, 591, 593–96, 598, 601–03<br />
Erlenbusch, Lt. Col. Robert C.: 406<br />
Ermsdorf: 226, 231–32, 234–35, 500<br />
Esch-sur-Sure: 545–47<br />
Eschdorf: 520–22, 534, 536–37, 540–43, 543n, 544–45,<br />
Ettelbruck: 45, 214, 216, 218–19, 224–27, 236, 482-<br />
83, 489, 501, 516–17, 520–22, 532–35, 537, 540,<br />
548, 628<br />
Eupen: 42, 45, 77, 86–87, 89, 102, 120, 270–71, 274,<br />
278, 335–36, 352, 579, 604, 669<br />
Euskirchen: 45, 62, 64, 65, 67<br />
Euskirchen-Kall-EhrangTrier railroad: 68<br />
Evacuation: 99, 106, 222, 235, 250, 254, 300, 370,<br />
372n, 453, 609, 668, 674<br />
Ewell, Lt. Col. Julian J.: 307, 445–48, 448n, 449–51,<br />
463<br />
Ezell, Capt. Bert: 457, 457n, 514–15, 515n<br />
Fairchild, Lt. Col. John C.: 199–200<br />
Fallschirm Armee Wagen (school) : 270<br />
Famenne Depression: 42, 44, 579<br />
Fanzel: 591, 594<br />
Faymonville: 81, 147, 158<br />
Ferry operations: 66, 215, 219, 253, 489<br />
Feuerwalze: 657<br />
Feulen: 518<br />
Fichtenhain: 26, 36<br />
Fickessen, Maj. Jack W.: 379<br />
Field Artillery Battalions<br />
5th: 130<br />
14th: 434<br />
15th: 109–10, 125<br />
22d: 554<br />
33d: 113, 129<br />
37th: 110<br />
38th: 125<br />
42d: 242, 244<br />
62d: 102<br />
90th: 538<br />
92d: 434
INDEX 699<br />
Field Artillery Battalions–Continued<br />
102d: 523<br />
107th: 214, 218–19, 221, 223, 226<br />
108th: 214, 217–18, 221, 226<br />
109th: 182, 185, 188<br />
113th: 375<br />
118th: 338<br />
176th: 252<br />
177th: 552<br />
188th: 388<br />
196th: 88, 119<br />
197th: 340–41, 365<br />
212th: 630<br />
229th: 194, 196, 199–202, 205<br />
253d: 554<br />
285th: 261<br />
314th: 516<br />
315th: 537<br />
326th: 577<br />
333d: 141n<br />
334th: 622<br />
370th: 97, 98n<br />
371st: 105<br />
559th: 141n, 658<br />
561st: 141n<br />
578th: 141n, 161<br />
589th: 151, 155–56, 164, 166, 389<br />
590th: 151, 164–66, 168<br />
591st: 151, 153–54, 161<br />
592d: 151, 155–56, 164<br />
687th: 193, 206, 209, 209n, 210, 219, 658<br />
740th: 141n, 314<br />
755th: 459, 464, 478-79<br />
770th: 141n, 400<br />
771st: 141n, 324, 464<br />
776th: 554<br />
905th: 519<br />
965th: 141n, 291, 398<br />
969th: 309, 459, 464, 470<br />
991st: 385<br />
Field Artillery Groups<br />
193d: 629<br />
333d: 323<br />
402d: 327<br />
406th: 132<br />
422d: 239<br />
Fighter Command, IX: 171<br />
Fighter Groups<br />
362d: 541, 553<br />
365th: 337<br />
366th: 92, 337<br />
370th: 418-19, 568-69, 573<br />
404th: 337<br />
405th: 496<br />
Fighter Squadrons<br />
377th: 548<br />
379th: 541<br />
389th: 92, 590<br />
390th: 92, 337<br />
Fighter Squadrons-Continued<br />
402d: 419<br />
430th: 592<br />
474th: 592n<br />
485th: 419<br />
506th: 337<br />
512th: 474<br />
513th: 474<br />
514th: 474<br />
Fisher, Lt. Col. Henry G.: 517, 538<br />
Fitzgerald, Lt. Col. Roy G.: 339<br />
Flak. See Antiaircraft, German.<br />
Flame throwers: 187, 197, 573, 636<br />
Flamierge: 470-71, 474, 476, 644<br />
Flamizoulle: 476-77, 479<br />
Flares: 153, 156, 194, 210, 216, 301, 303, 321, 335,<br />
340, 386, 405, 414, 421, 456, 589<br />
Flohimont: 619-20<br />
Fords: 316, 318, 321-22, 325, 356, 363, 369, 371<br />
Forest of Ardennes: 40, 42<br />
Forward observers: 94, 97, 98n, 119, 125, 152, 182,<br />
196, 223, 241, 391<br />
Foxhole lines: 94, 194, 196, 199, 256, 283, 328<br />
Foy: 297, 301, 313, 400, 450, 455-56, 462, 463, 475<br />
Foy-Notre Dame: 565, 567-69, 574<br />
Fraiture: 388, 390-91, 581-82, 585, 588, 590, 599, 667<br />
Francorchamps: 266, 337, 360<br />
Frankland, Lt. Col. Ernest: 337<br />
Fr<strong>as</strong>er, Lt. Col. Harvey R.: 318, 355, 429<br />
Frederick the Great: 9-10<br />
Freesland, Capt. Joseph: 153<br />
French forces: 51, 560<br />
Freyneux: 386, 582, 583, 585-87<br />
Fridline, Maj. Gaylord D.: 168<br />
Friedman, Maj. Albert: 542<br />
Führen: 214, 217-21, 223, 223n<br />
Fuhrman Farm: 636-37<br />
Fuller, Col. Hurley E.: 179, 182, 184-85, 188, 190-91<br />
Fuller, Lt. Col. William H. G.: 283, 403-06<br />
Gaffey, Maj. Gen. Hugh J.: 512, 514, 524-25, 527,<br />
530-32, 548, 551, 553, 627. See also Armored<br />
Division, 4th.<br />
Galhausen: 411, 414–15<br />
Galland, Generalleutnant Adolf: 663<br />
Gardner, Lt. Col. Glenn H.: 548<br />
Garvey, Capt. Jack J.: 116<br />
Gavin, Maj. Gen. James M.: 306-07, 336, 343–44,<br />
352, 367, 371, 390-91, 590, 599-600. See also<br />
Airborne Division, 82d; Corps XVIII<br />
(Airborne).<br />
Gay, Brig. Gen. Hobart R.: 488, 510n, 606n, 609<br />
Gaynor, Capt. Paul F.: 225n<br />
Gebert, Pfc. Jack: 366<br />
Geilenkirchen: 29, 176, 427, 428<br />
Gemiind: 174, 178, 180, 186, 669<br />
Gentingen: 216, 222, 534<br />
Gercke, General der Infanterie Rudolf: 66<br />
Gerimont: 620, 644
700 THE AR DENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
German Air Force. See Luftwaffe.<br />
German <strong>Army</strong>: 7–8, 13, 675<br />
German General Staff: 6–7, 11, 18–20, 31, 49, 64, 76,<br />
128, 675<br />
German Navy ground troops: 8, 63, 143, 177, 215,<br />
260<br />
German units<br />
<strong>Army</strong> Groups<br />
B: 21–24, 26, 29, 32–37, 49, 64, 68, 70, 71 ,73,<br />
81, 82, 180, 474, 486, 604, 647, 650, 662<br />
664, 664n, 666, 674<br />
<strong>Center</strong>: 7<br />
G: 33, 35, 37, 482, 486<br />
H. See Student.<br />
Luettwitz: 614, 619<br />
Student: 27, 33, 34, 37<br />
Armies<br />
Parachute: 208n<br />
Replacement: 7, 37, 63<br />
Reserve: 36<br />
First: 37, 240<br />
Fifth Panzer: 14, 14n, 15, 22, 25–26, 29, 33-<br />
34, 59, 67, 69, 75, 120, 135, 142, 143, 145,<br />
147, 173, 175, 175n, 176, 180, 213, 229, 264,<br />
293n, 316, 317, 320, 323, 327, 356, 401, 428–<br />
29, 435, 441, 443–44, 454, 465, 474–75, 480,<br />
482, 557, 563–65, 567, 574, 578, 580–81, 585,<br />
591, 603–04, 613, 631, 642, 647, 649, 656,<br />
657, 658, 667, 668, 669–72<br />
Sixth SS Panzer: 16, 22, 25, 26, 29, 33, 37, 50,<br />
58–59, 62, 65, 67, 69, 73–77, 80–81, 86–87,<br />
89, 102, 112, 119–20, 123, 128, 130, 134–35,<br />
145–47, 162, 175, 260, 269, 270, 278, 292,<br />
293n, 332, 337, 339, 361, 369, 374, 401, 411,<br />
428, 435, 444, 480, 563–64, 578–81, 590–91,<br />
595, 598, 601, 603-05, 613, 623, 631, 649,<br />
656, 657, 667, 669-72, 675<br />
Seventh: 22, 25, 26, 29, 33-34, 50, 67-70, 75,<br />
175-76, 212-13, 215, 218, 222, 226-27, 229,<br />
231-32, 235, 237, 240, 245, 251, 258, 262n,<br />
327, 465, 474, 482-83, 488, 494-95, 506, 511,<br />
517, 519, 521-22, 532-33, 537, 540, 564, 606,<br />
638, 641–42, 657, 659, 661, 669, 672<br />
Fifteenth: 25, 29, 33-35, 59, 63, 69-71, 75, 579,<br />
603, 664n<br />
Nineteenth: 25, 37<br />
Twenty-fifth (ghost) : 50<br />
Corps<br />
Rothkirch: 537<br />
I SS Panzer: 76, 77, 80-82, 89, 90, 96, 120, 121,<br />
129, 144, 147, 264, 272, 280, 369, 374, 400,<br />
580, 629, 631-32<br />
II SS Panzer: 77, 81, 130, 369, 374, 565, 580-<br />
82, 585, 590-91, 595, 599, 601, 657<br />
XII SS: 29, 32<br />
XVII SS: 176<br />
XXXVII: 356<br />
German Units-Continued<br />
Corps-Continued<br />
XXXIX Panzer: 614, 619<br />
XLVII Panzer: 174, 176-81, 194, 195, 198, 207,<br />
216, 298, 303-05, 317, 320-24, 328, 393, 435-<br />
36, 443, 459, 465, 477, 511, 567, 570-71, 574,<br />
577, 619, 646, 667, 672<br />
XLVIII Panzer: 37<br />
LIII: 635<br />
LVIII Panzer: 174, 194-96, 204, 272, 319-20,<br />
329, 356-57, 359, 378, 380-82, 385, 393, 398,<br />
400, 401, 417, 429, 456, 576, 580, 614, 657<br />
LXVI: 14245, 152, 156-57, 165, 168, 170, 175,<br />
187, 277-78, 283, 284, 292-93, 393, 396, 400-<br />
401, 403-04, 410, 414, 580<br />
LXVII Artillery (Corps Monschau) : 76, 86–<br />
87, 89, 135, 579-80, 604, 669<br />
LXXX: 212, 229, 240, 255-56, 482, 491, 494,<br />
503, 506-07, 669<br />
LXXXV: 181, 207, 212-13, 216, 255, 482, 522,<br />
533-35, 537, 540<br />
766th Volks Artillery: 178<br />
XC: 486<br />
Divisions<br />
Adolf Hitler: 76<br />
Brandenburg: 270n<br />
Grossdeutschland Panzer: 292-93, 401, 533,<br />
545<br />
Panzer Lehr: 37, 39, 174, 174n, 175, 178, 186,<br />
207, 299-304, 320, 323, 325-26, 328-29, 429,<br />
435-38, 440, 449-52, 454, 456-59, 463, 465-<br />
66, 470, 565, 567, 569-70, 570n, 571-72,613,<br />
621-23, 631, 643, 664, 665<br />
1st SS Panzer: 76-77, 82, 90-91, 112, 120, 128,<br />
130, 133, 149n, 150, 175, 260-62, 264-66,<br />
269, 278, 280, 282, 290, 314, 316, 318, 335,<br />
338-39, 347, 359, 363, 366, 368-70, 372-74,<br />
376–77, 393, 397, 443, 557, 560, 578, 580,<br />
590, 599-600, 605, 614, 619, 623-27, 631,<br />
635, 669<br />
2d Panzer: 39, 144, 175, 177-78, 180, 183-84,<br />
186-92, 264, 295, 298-99, 301-04, 317-18,<br />
320-21, 323, 325, 357, 382, 390, 420, 428-30,<br />
435-38, 440-41, 443, 448, 449, 452-55, 463,<br />
563-65, 567-70, 570n, 571-72, 613, 672<br />
2d SS Panzer: 77, 382, 385-86, 388-90, 392,<br />
406, 412, 415, 420, 429, 574, 580-81, 583-84,<br />
587, 590-93, 595, 598-99, 601, 667<br />
3d Panzer Grenadier: 121, 133-35, 580, 604,<br />
614, 616, 619-21, 625, 644-46<br />
3d Parachute: 76, 77, 81-82, 85, 90, 130, 135,<br />
145, 146–47 150, 163, 261, 264, 337, 339,<br />
369, 374<br />
5th Parachute: 186, 207-09, 213-17, 219-23,<br />
322, 324, 327-28, 465, 470, 476, 480, 511,<br />
521, 529, 531, 533-35, 549, 555, 615, 642, 657<br />
9th Panzer: 474, 563-65, 567, 569, 571-72, 613
INDEX 701<br />
German Units-Continued<br />
Divisions-Continued<br />
9th SS Panzer: 74, 77, 290, 374, 393, 409, 418-<br />
19, 580-81, 590, 592, 595, 598-99, 601, 603,<br />
619, 632, 671<br />
9th VG: 640–42<br />
10th SS Panzer: 35, 667, 671<br />
11th Panzer: 671<br />
12th SS Panzer: 74, 76-77, 82, 90-91, 98, 115,<br />
121-22, 125, 129-31, 133-34, 261, 264-65,<br />
369, 374, 578, 580, 598, 601, 619, 631-33,<br />
667, 670<br />
12th VG: 76, 81, 83, 92-93, 122, 130, 135, 260,<br />
604<br />
15th Panzer Grenadier: 474-79, 563, 607, 615,<br />
619, 644<br />
17th Luftwaffe Feld: 623<br />
17th SS Panzer Grenadier: 35<br />
18th Air Force Field: 143<br />
18th VG: 80, 142–45, 150, 152, 154-55, 157,<br />
162-63, 165, 277, 282-84, 292, 396, 403-04,<br />
407-08, 418-19, 603<br />
21st Panzer: 33, 35<br />
26th VG: 145, 177-78, 180-82, 186-87, 191,<br />
207-08, 299, 301-02, 304, 323, 449-51, 454,<br />
456, 458-59, 463, 465-66, 470, 475, 480, 528,<br />
555, 615, 619, 632, 651, 657, 661<br />
49th Infantry: 35<br />
62d VG: 143–45, 152-54, 157, 159-60, 284-85,<br />
292, 396, 402, 403, 407, 410-11, 414-15, 417,<br />
420, 603<br />
79th VG: 522, 533–41<br />
89th Infantry: 35<br />
116th Panzer: 69, 153, 175, 195, 196, 198-202,<br />
204, 291, 317-20, 354, 357-59, 378, 380-85,<br />
395, 397-98, 428-30, 435, 437, 441–42, 565,<br />
567, 574, 577, 580, 661<br />
167th VG: 619, 623, 626, 631-32, 635<br />
212th VG: 213, 229, 239–40, 244-45, 248, 252-<br />
53, 257-58, 484-85, 490-92, 494, 496, 499-<br />
501, 503, 506, 507, 511, 669<br />
246th VG: 35, 76, 87, 604<br />
272d VG: 90, 103<br />
276th VG: 213, 220, 222, 228-29, 231-32, 234-<br />
37, 240, 245, 256, 258, 483, 494-95, 501, 503-<br />
04, 50607, 511, 672<br />
277th VG: 76, 80-83, 87, 94-98, 103, 115, 121,<br />
134, 135<br />
326th VG: 61, 76, 80, 87-89, 102-03, 119-20,<br />
134-35<br />
340th VG: 619, 632<br />
352d VG: 213,215-16,218-20,222,224-27,235,<br />
236, 483, 511, 516, 520-22, 533-35, 537<br />
560th VG: 195-96, 198, 204, 354, 358-59, 380,<br />
382-86, 388-90, 395, 397-98, 574, 580-81,<br />
583, 585, 592-93, 595, 598, 667<br />
Brigades<br />
Fuehrer Begleit: 170, 174, 174n, 175, 278, 292,<br />
293n, 396, 401-04, 407-10, 416–21, 480, 533,<br />
German Units-Continued<br />
Brigades-Continued<br />
575-77, 580-81, 584-85, 599, 613-16, 619–<br />
22, 631, 645-46, 671<br />
Fuehrer Grenadier: 521-22, 530, 533-34, 536-<br />
37, 540-41, 543-46, 614, 638, 641-42<br />
11th Assault Gun: 214, 215, 528<br />
15th Volks Werfer: 178<br />
150th Panzer (Brandenburgei) : 270, 270n,<br />
360-61, 363<br />
Regiments<br />
1st SS Panzer: 90, 105, 260, 339, 368, 377.<br />
See also Kampfgruppe Peiper.<br />
2d SS Panzer Grenadier: 339, 343, 352, 588<br />
3d Panzer: 187, 191-92, 295-96, 386, 438, 452,<br />
456, 570, 583, 587, 592, 595, 597<br />
4th Panzer Grenadier: 390-91, 583, 585-86,<br />
588-90, 595, 597<br />
10th Panzer Grenadier: 572<br />
12th SS Panzer: 131-32<br />
13th Parachute: 215, 222, 531<br />
14th Parachute: 209, 215-16, 219, 222, 328,<br />
527, 552, 623-24, 635-36<br />
15th Parachute: 209,214-17,219,222,525,529,<br />
607, 637<br />
16th Panzer: 358, 575<br />
19th Panzer Grenadier: 599–601<br />
25th Panzer Grenadier: 115, 129, 131, 601-02<br />
26th Panzer Grenadier: 133<br />
27th, 12th VG Division: 83, 85,92, 94, 129, 604<br />
29th Panzer Grenadier: 134<br />
39th, 26th VG Division: 180-82, 186, 207, 323,<br />
458-59, 470, 475, 478, 480, 615, 645<br />
48th, 12th VG Division: 83, 85, 92, 94, 604<br />
60th Panzer Grenadier: 145, 153, 197-98, 358,<br />
380, 442, 575<br />
77th, 26th VG Division: 180-82, 186, 301-02,<br />
304, 456, 463, 476-78, 480, 645<br />
78th, 26th VG Division: 180, 186, 301-02, 304,<br />
456, 463, 475, 630<br />
89th, 12th VG Division: 122<br />
104th Panzer Grenadier: 615-16<br />
115th. See Kampfgruppe 115th.<br />
156th, 116th Panzer Division: 197-99, 380–81<br />
164th, 62d VG Division: 154, 159-60, 284, 292,<br />
397, 414<br />
182d Flak: 178<br />
183d, 62d VG Division: 152-53, 161, 292, 403,<br />
405<br />
190th, 62d VG Division: 152-54, 292, 397, 402,<br />
410, 414<br />
208th, 79th VG Division: 534<br />
212th, 79th VG Division: 534<br />
266th, 79th VG Division: 538<br />
293d, 18th VG Division: 145, 154-55, 165, 168,<br />
292, 404, 418-19<br />
294th 18th VG Division: 80, 145-46, 150,<br />
155-56, 162-63, 165, 277, 283, 292, 404-05
702 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
German Units-Continued<br />
Regiments-Continued<br />
295th, 18th VG Division: 145–46, 150,292,396,<br />
404<br />
304th Panzer Grenadier: 183, 187, 436, 438,<br />
455, 570<br />
316th, 212th VG Division: 240, 245, 251-53,<br />
494<br />
320th, 212th VG Division: 240–44,247–48,251,<br />
253, 484, 494, 496<br />
352d, 246th VG Division: 604<br />
423d, 212th VG Division: 240-43, 245, 254,<br />
256, 484, 494<br />
751st, 326th VG Division: 89, 103<br />
752d, 326th VG Division: 89<br />
753d, 326th VG Division: 89, 119<br />
901st Panzer Grenadier: 206, 304, 457, 463,<br />
465, 471, 475-76, 480, 623<br />
902d Panzer Grenadier: 207,299,304,326,437,<br />
440, 456, 458-59, 463, 643<br />
903d Panzer Grenadier: 438<br />
914th, 352d VG Division: 216, 219-20, 222,<br />
483, 516<br />
915th, 352d VG Division: 216–19,221-22, 225,<br />
516, 520-23, 535<br />
916th, 352d VG Division: 216, 218, 220-22,<br />
225-26,483<br />
986th, 276th VG Division: 229-31, 234<br />
987th, 276th VG Division: 231, 236, 245–46,<br />
252, 504<br />
988th, 276th VG Division: 230, 232, 236, 484,<br />
499, 503-04, 507<br />
989th, 277th VG Division: 96-98, 115-16<br />
990th, 277th VG Division: 82, 96-98, 103, 119<br />
991st, 277th VG Division: 97<br />
1128th, 560th VG Division: 198, 204, 357, 380,<br />
383<br />
1129th, 560th VG Division: 383<br />
1130th, 560th VG Division: 196, 199, 203-04,<br />
386, 398, 583<br />
Kampfgruppen<br />
Bayer: 378, 380, 384<br />
Krag: 420-21, 599, 602<br />
Kunkel: 324-25, 464-66<br />
Peiper: 90-92, 260-61, 261n, 262-64, 264n,<br />
265-69, 307, 318, 335–43, 347-49, 351, 353,<br />
355, 359-60, 363-69, 372-77, 385, 401, 418,<br />
428, 578, 581, 599-600, 669, 670<br />
115th: 474, 477-79, 644<br />
Battalions<br />
3d Grenadier: 645<br />
5th Parachute Engineer: 214-15<br />
12th Fuesilier: 129<br />
18th VG Mobile: 277, 282, 292<br />
18th VG Replacement: 143, 168<br />
23d Festung: 245<br />
26th Reconnaissance: 302, 323-25, 476-77, 669<br />
28th Panzer Engineer Battalion: 183<br />
German Units-Continued<br />
Battalions-Continued<br />
116th Panzer Reconnaissance: 356, 380-81<br />
212th Fuesilier: 257, 484<br />
506th Panzer: 162<br />
519th Heavy Antitank: 393<br />
600th <strong>Army</strong> Engineer: 178<br />
669th Ost: 168<br />
999th Penal: 494<br />
Detachments<br />
501st SS Panzer: 260<br />
Gerolstein: 623<br />
Gerolstein Forest: 81<br />
Geronsweiler: 571<br />
Gerow, Maj. Gen. Leonard T.: 53-54, 78, 103-04,<br />
120, 134, 330, 335, 339, 611. See also Corps, V.<br />
Gersdorff, Generalmajor Rudolf Freiherr von: 212,<br />
642<br />
Geyershof: 252<br />
Gibb, Col. Frederick W.: 130<br />
Gilbreth, Col. Joseph H.: 295-97, 297n, 448, 473-74<br />
Gilsdorf: 500-501<br />
Ginder, Col. Philip D.: 107<br />
Girst: 245<br />
Givet: 21, 28, 42, 45, 69, 424, 426, 434, 439, 443, 557,<br />
559-61<br />
Givry: 474, 476<br />
Gladding, Maj. Leon D.: 542<br />
Glider Infantry Regiments<br />
325th: 346, 390-91, 581, 585, 590, 595-97<br />
327th: 307, 456, 459, 462-64, 466-68, 470-72, 474,<br />
478-80<br />
401st: 307<br />
Glider operations: 468, 609<br />
Gniot, 1st Lt. Charles R.: 529<br />
Goehbels, Reich Minister Joseph: 8, 8n, 63, 623<br />
Goering, Reichsmarschall Hermann: 1, 72, 208n,<br />
672<br />
Corn, Maj. John W.: 243, 246<br />
GOUVY: 291, 395, 397-99, 401, 406<br />
Gouvy Station: 286, 398-99<br />
Gramm, Maj. Albert L.: 546<br />
Grand Halleux: 370, 373, 581<br />
“Grand Slam”: 20<br />
Grand Trisogne: 569<br />
Grandménil: 381, 386, 583, 587, 590-97, 601<br />
Greece: 2, 269<br />
“Green” troops: 55, 59, 90, 123, 141, 144, 154, 196,<br />
198, 204, 523, 534, 591n, 592, 594<br />
Greif (Operation) : 269-71, 360-61<br />
Grenades: 110, 111, 115, 128, 192, 218n, 224, 236,<br />
253, 256, 303, 362, 367, 371<br />
Grevenmacher: 34<br />
Grevils-Brésil: 522, 534<br />
Grindhausen: 181<br />
Griswold, Lt. Col. George M.: 450-51<br />
Grosbous: 226, 236, 520-23, 540-41<br />
Grosskampenberg: 151, 153
INDEX 703<br />
Grosslangenfeld: 138, 143, 166<br />
Grow, Maj. Gen. Robert W.: 607, 628-32, 634. See<br />
also Armored Division, 6th<br />
Grufflange: 291, 396-97, 402, 403n, 410, 414<br />
Guderian, Generaloberst Heinz: 1, 675<br />
Guns. See Antiaircraft guns; Antitank guns; Artil-<br />
lery; Howitzers; Mortars; Tank destroyers;<br />
Tanks; Weapons<br />
Guns, British: 665<br />
Guns, German<br />
multiple 20-mm: 185<br />
40-mm SP: 386<br />
88-mm: 192, 302, 328, 653<br />
120-mm: 213<br />
170-mm: 629<br />
SP (<strong>as</strong>sault): 71-72, 77, 156, 220, 235, 240, 328,<br />
528, 653<br />
Habay-la-Neuve: 525<br />
Habiemont: 343<br />
Habscheid: 141<br />
Haid: 436<br />
Haig: 674<br />
Haislip, Maj. Gen. Wade H.: 488<br />
Halenfelder Wald: 164<br />
Half-tracks: 184n, 210, 234<br />
Hall, Capt. John W.: 233<br />
Haller: 228-30, 232, 234, 236, 496, 499, 501, 503–44<br />
Hallerbach: 505<br />
Hallschlag: 137, 141<br />
Hamilton, Lt. Col. Paul: 541–43, 543n<br />
Hamm Farm: 504<br />
Hampteau: 378, 431, 575, 577<br />
Han: 382<br />
Hansen, Lt. Col. Harold D.: 361<br />
Hardigny: 298-99<br />
Hardt woods: 501, 503<br />
Hardthof: 499, 503<br />
Hargimont: 433, 436, 567, 569, 573<br />
Harlange: 209, 606, 625, 635-37, 642–43<br />
Harmon, Maj. Gen. Ernest N.: 434, 440–41, 565-66,<br />
568-73, 591. See also Armored Division, 2d.<br />
Harper, Col. Joseph H.: 307, 468<br />
Harper, Lt. Col. Ralph S.: 295-96<br />
Harperscheid: 80<br />
Harrison, Lt. Col. Willard E.: 352<br />
Harrison, Brig. Gen. William K., Jr.: 335, 364-65,<br />
372-73, 376<br />
Harrold, Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> L.: 230, 233, 615<br />
Harsin: 433, 436, 438<br />
Harspelt: 194, 197, 199, 203<br />
Hartman, Lt. Col. William F.: 309<br />
Harwick, Maj. Robert F.: 454-55<br />
H<strong>as</strong>brouck, Brig. Gen. Robert W.: 273-75, 279, 282,<br />
285-90, 393, 395, 397-98, 400, 406-07, 411-15,<br />
418-21, 585, 593, 597. See also Armored Divi-<br />
sion, 7th.<br />
H<strong>as</strong>selt: 426<br />
Hatfield, Sgt. Lawrence L.: 521n<br />
Haute-Bodeux: 346<br />
Haversin: 433<br />
Havrenne: 440, 570-72<br />
Heath, Lt. Col. Calvin A.: 641<br />
Hebronval: 401, 412<br />
Heckhuscheid: 143, 152-54, 157, 159, 161, 197, 284<br />
Hedree: 571<br />
Heerlen: 274, 603<br />
Heiderscheid: 508, 516-19, 522, 534-38, 540–41, 543,<br />
545<br />
Heiderscheidergrund: 518, 532, 536, 540, 543, 543n,<br />
544–47<br />
Heilmann, Col. Ludwig: 207-09, 214-15, 322-23,<br />
327-28, 529, 531<br />
Heinerscheid: 175, 181, 184, 185, 188, 191, 198, 204<br />
Heinsberg: 53<br />
Heist, 1st Lt. Edgar C.: 485n<br />
Hemmeres: 292<br />
Hemroulle: 477-80<br />
Henbest, Lt. Col. Ross C.: 181, 188<br />
Hendrix, S/Sgt. James R.: 555<br />
Herbomont: 307<br />
Herborn: 240, 243, 247–48, 251-52<br />
Herbstnebel (Plan) : 26<br />
Herdrick, 1st Lt. Lorenz: 149<br />
Herlong, Lt. Col. Robert: 341–42, 349<br />
Herresbach: 150, 162<br />
Hertgrund (ravine) : 246<br />
Herve: 42<br />
Heuem: 150, 163, 273, 277<br />
Heydte, Col. Friedrich A. Freiherr von der: 270-71,<br />
271n<br />
Hickey, Brig. Gen. Doyle: 585, 587, 591-92, 601-02<br />
Hierheck: 542<br />
Higgins, Brig. Gen. Gerald J.: 453, 455<br />
High Ardennes: 42–44<br />
Hightower, Lt. Col. John M.: 86, 94, 94n, 95, 105-06<br />
Highway N4: 428, 431<br />
Highway N12: 294-96, 298-99, 445–448<br />
Highway N15: See Liege-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway.<br />
Highway N26: 205n, 622<br />
Highway N28: 353-54, 385, 388-89, 413, 581<br />
Highway N46: 319<br />
Hills<br />
313: 243, 247, 250, 254, 257, 484, 496-97, 499, 501<br />
329: 250, 254, 256<br />
402: 229<br />
490: 642<br />
510: 450-52, 630<br />
612: 151<br />
Hillyard, Lt. Col. Harry: 568<br />
Himmler, Heinrich: 7, 263, 623<br />
Hinderhausen: 402, 407, 409, 416–17<br />
Hinds, Col. Sidney R.: 572<br />
Hines, Col. John L., Jr.: 628-29<br />
Hirschfelder, Col. Chester J.: 95, 105, 107<br />
Hitler, Adolf: 9-10, 12-15, 17, 64, 174n, 178, 292-93,<br />
482, 533, 580, 614, 651-52.
704 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Hitler-Continued<br />
and <strong>as</strong>s<strong>as</strong>sination attempt, July 1944: 6-7, 11,<br />
292n<br />
and capture of Antwerp <strong>as</strong> final objective: 2, 16-<br />
17, 19, 19n, 20, 22, 27, 28, 31, 75<br />
and the capture of B<strong>as</strong>togne: 475, 475n, 477, 564,<br />
613, 647<br />
and counteroffensive planning and timing: 19-24,<br />
26-32, 33-39, 63, 68-72, 75, 135, 142, 173, 175,<br />
195, 212, 435, 443, 486, 579, 603, 604, 656, 665,<br />
666, 668, 670, 671,<br />
decision for counteroffensive in the Ardennes:<br />
1-7, 10-18, 20, 39, 48, 673-75, 676<br />
Fuehrer Conferences: 1-2, En, 13, 21-22, 31<br />
and manpower “comb-out”: 8-9, 15, 63<br />
and Meuse bridgeheads <strong>as</strong> initial objective: 19, 22,<br />
69, 75, 563<br />
and the 1940 Ardennes thrust: 18, 20, 38n, 40,<br />
269<br />
and the OKW Reserve: 474, 671<br />
and Operation Greif and Skorzeny: 269-70<br />
orders to take no prisoners: 262, 262n<br />
relationship with staff and field commanders:<br />
6-7, 11, 14, 1618, 23-24, 30-32, 33, 35-36, 76,<br />
173, 402, 647, 675<br />
security me<strong>as</strong>ures for counteroffensive: 11, 15, 19,<br />
21, 23, 48-51, 58, 61, 66, 70-71<br />
sole commander for counteroffensive: 11, 18, 30,<br />
57<br />
turns attention from Ardennes: 673<br />
and use of paratroops: 269-70<br />
views on American-British co-operation: 12, 17, 18,<br />
671<br />
Hitzfeld, General der Infanterie Otto: 76, 86-87,<br />
604<br />
Hobbs, Maj. Gen. Leland S.: 334-36, 341, 359, 363,<br />
365-66, 371-74, 376, 401. See also Infantry Divi-<br />
sion, 30th.<br />
Hodges, Lt. Gen. Courtney H.: 53, 306, 315, 344,<br />
411n, 424, 426-27, 433-34, 513, 566, 587, 610-12.<br />
See also <strong>Army</strong>, First.<br />
and deployment of reinforcements: 305, 306, 331,<br />
333, 336, 346, 431, 565, 583<br />
and V Corps request for Wahlerscheid with-<br />
drawal: 103, 104, 330<br />
problems with the fall of Manhay: 590, 597<br />
and St. Vith defense and withdrawal: 395, 406,<br />
412, 413, 443<br />
Hodges, Capt. Preston C.: 378<br />
Hodgson, Lt. Col. Reginald H.:291<br />
Hoecker, Generalleutnant Hans-Kurt: 623, 626<br />
Hofen: 78-79, 87-89, 102-103, 119-20, 133, 134, 579<br />
Hoffmann-Schonborn, Generalmajor: 142, 396<br />
Hogan, Lt. Col. Samuel M.: 353, 387<br />
Hoge, Brig. Gen. William M.: 158-60, 273, 284-85,<br />
290, 392, 400, 406, 410, 412-15<br />
Hogne: 431, 572, 574<br />
Hohes Venn: 42, 44, 46, 76-77, 259, 270, 361, 368,<br />
579, 670<br />
Holies Venn (Operation) : 270-71<br />
Hohwald (hill) : 499, 503<br />
Holbrook, Brig. Gen. Willard A., Jr.: 618<br />
Holdingen: 395, 397<br />
Holland: 29, 48, 176, 274, 305, 334<br />
Hollange: 548, 551<br />
Hollerath: 89, 95-96, 98<br />
Holzheim: 148-51, 162<br />
Holzthum: 181-82, 185-86, 192-93, 207<br />
Homan, Maj. Sammie N.: 450<br />
Homprk: 459, 470, 551, 607, 609, 613, 619, 623, 627<br />
“Honeymoon Trail”: 611<br />
Honsfeld: 81, 83, 90-91, 94, 162, 261<br />
Honsfelder Wald: 93, 106<br />
Hoover, Lt. Col. Phillip F.: 161<br />
Horrocks, Lt. Gen. Brian G.: 426, 557, 561<br />
Horses: 40, 70, 82, 177, 194, 214, 215, 229, 260, 284,<br />
292, 299, 396, 414, 665, 667, 668<br />
Horthy, Admiral Miklós von Nagybánya: 270<br />
Hoscheid: 181, 215, 219-23, 255<br />
Hosdorf: 216, 218<br />
Hosinpen: 175. 180-82. 185-87, 192-93, 205, 207, 669<br />
Hospitals and hospital trains: 61, 223, 668<br />
Hotton: 318, 339, 345–46, 353, 355-56, 371, 377-82,<br />
383-86, 391, 401, 429-31, 566, 575-77, 581,<br />
583, 587, 601. See also Soy-Hotton road.<br />
Hotton-Marche road: 438, 441, 442, 565, 574-75,<br />
581, 661<br />
Houffalize: 296, 306, 307, 312, 315-18, 320, 344, 345,<br />
347, 352, 354, 356-57, 359, 381, 389-90, 393, 397,<br />
401, 452, 605, 612, 617, 623, 647<br />
Houffalize-B<strong>as</strong>togne road: 304, 307, 315, 317, 318,<br />
319, 452, 456<br />
Houmont: 620, 644<br />
Howitzers: 149, 164, 202, 204, 218, 221, 232, 251-52,<br />
295, 297-98 387, 658, 659<br />
pack: 308<br />
75-mm: 149<br />
105-mm: 182, 186, 219, 239, 308, 466-67<br />
155-mm: 125, 156, 388, 398, 459-60, 478<br />
8-inch: 161, 281<br />
Howze, Col. Robert L., Jr.: 353, 378, 379, 382, 384<br />
Hoy, Lt. Col. Charles E.: 430<br />
Hritsik, 2d Lt. Michael: 518, 518n<br />
Hubermont: 644, 646<br />
Huddleston, 1st Lt. Jarrett M., Jr.: 159<br />
Huebner, Maj. Gen. Clarence R.: 103, 443<br />
Huldange: 205, 290<br />
Hull, Pfc. S. E.: 640n<br />
Humain: 433, 440–41, 565, 570-74<br />
Hungarian forces: 2<br />
Hunningen: 86, 92-95, 106, 126, 279-80, 282-83, 285,<br />
396, 404, 408<br />
Hürtgen Forest: 26, 30, 42, 53, 55, 129, 179, 238<br />
Hustead, Maj. Charles L.: 454-55<br />
Hutton, Col. Carl I.: 435n, 441, 572
INDEX 705<br />
Hyduke, 1st Lt. Edward P.: 300-302, 448<br />
Huy: 25, 69, 264, 265, 342, 426, 434, 557, 561, 566,<br />
578<br />
Ihren Creek: 151, 167<br />
Illuminating shell: 89, 128, 129, 130, 380, 602-03<br />
Imgenbroich: 102<br />
Infantry: 239, 258<br />
German/American strength ratio: 252, 650-51<br />
German/American support weapons: 653, 654<br />
Infantry Battalion, 99th: 359, 361<br />
Infantry Divisions<br />
1st: 86, 129, 335<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 129, 133<br />
reinforces at Butgenbach: 113, 128, 130, 131,<br />
134, 360, 604<br />
2d: 55, 138-41, 156-57<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 104, 116, 123-24<br />
command and organization: 54, 120<br />
defense of Rocherath-Krinkelt sector: 95, 98,<br />
105-12, 114-18, 120-25, 126-27, 128-29, 270,<br />
604<br />
Wahlerscheid attack and withdrawal: 54, 79-<br />
80, 82, 86, 87, 89, 91, 101-04, 107-12, 113,<br />
158, 330, 335<br />
withdrawal to Elsenborn ridge: 131-34<br />
4th: GO, 73, 458<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 55, 252, 253, 258<br />
command and organization: 55, 238, 508<br />
defense of the Sauer-Moselle sector: 213, 227,<br />
230, 231, 236, 238-58, 313, 484, 488, 490-94,<br />
496, 499, 507-08, 511-12<br />
5th: 489-90, 490n, 492-94, 496-508<br />
8th: 54<br />
9th: 133-34<br />
26th<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 512<br />
command and organization: 488, 510-12<br />
counterattack toward B<strong>as</strong>togne: 515, 518,<br />
520-23, 530, 532, 534-35, 537, 540-11, 543n,<br />
544-46, 606, 627, 63742<br />
28th: 59, 73, 137-38, 152, 157-58, 460, 519<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 55, 179, 179n, 192n, 193, 204, 210,<br />
219, 220, 224, 421<br />
command and organization: 55, 179, 214, 290,<br />
309, 508, 522<br />
defense of the Our and Clerf crossings: 176<br />
77, 179-202, 203-06, 208-10, 279, 289, 294,<br />
312-15, 331<br />
defense of the Sauer-Our sector: 213-27, 229,<br />
241, 249, 488, 515, 521<br />
operations in the VIII Corps barrier lines:<br />
322-24, 38-28, 393, 457, 552, 607<br />
30th<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 340, 377<br />
command and organization: 334-35, 342<br />
engagement with Kampfgruppe Peiper north<br />
of the Amblève: 268-69, 335-45, 347-51,<br />
353, 359, 364, 366, 371, 374, 376-77, 401,<br />
Infantry Divisions—Continued<br />
30th—Continued<br />
578, 580, 582n, 592, 597<br />
moves south from Ninth <strong>Army</strong> area: 130,<br />
269, 289, 333-35,427<br />
35th: 486, 488-89, 539, 606, 606n, 607, 609, 624-27,<br />
629-30, 634-37, 642<br />
66th: 334<br />
75th: 73, 334, 385, 387-88, 427, 433-34, 442, 582,<br />
591n, 594<br />
78th: 54, 103<br />
80th: 225, 483, 486-87, 489-90, 493<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 517, 538, 548-49<br />
command and organization: 490, 508, 510-12,<br />
515-16, 539<br />
counterattack toward B<strong>as</strong>togne: 515-21, 523,<br />
532-41, 543n, 548, 609, 637<br />
83d: 55, 238-39, 574<br />
84th: 176, 571<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 428, 577<br />
command and organization: 427, 431<br />
operations on the Ourthe River line: 321,<br />
379, 381, 427-42, 566, 570, 574, 577, 582n,<br />
585<br />
87th: 334, 486, 612, 617-18, 621-22, 643-44<br />
95th: 489<br />
99th: 54-56, 59, 73, 78-81, 126, 137, 138, 260,<br />
330, 658<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 98, 99, 106, 123<br />
command and organization: 77-79<br />
defense of the northern shoulder: 80-102,<br />
104, 105-06, 107, 109, 111-13, 115, 117-20,<br />
129, 131-34, 149, 150, 152, 161, 162, 270.<br />
332, 335, 604<br />
102d: 427<br />
104th: 334<br />
106th<br />
c<strong>as</strong>ualties: 166, 168, 421-22, 593<br />
command and organization: 138, 205, 273-74,<br />
395, 401<br />
battle of the Schnee Eifel sector: 136, 136n,<br />
145, 154-57, 161-71, 275, 282-84, 289, 292,<br />
331<br />
initial attack of: 85, 120, 148-50, 152-54,<br />
158-61, 196-97, 272, 274, 330, 658<br />
St. Vith defense and withdrawal: 205, 273,<br />
275-77, 281-84, 288, 290, 312, 331, 357,<br />
389, 392-93, 395, 401-02, 412-13, 583<br />
situation before the counteroffensive: 55, 59,<br />
60, 73, 137-41, 144, 144n, 145, 151-52,<br />
194-95<br />
Infantry Regiments<br />
2d: 489, 493, 497-99, 501, 503-04<br />
8th: 238, 246, 253, 262n<br />
9th: 94-95, 101, 103-04, 106, 107-10, 110n, 115-17,<br />
122-23<br />
10th: 489-90, 490n, 491-93, 496-97, 499, 501-04,<br />
506, 508<br />
11th: 489-90, 493, 498-99, 502-06
706 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Infantry Regiments—Continued<br />
12th: 213, 230, 238, 240-52, 254, 256-58, 484,<br />
490-92, 504<br />
16th: 130<br />
18th: 133, 134, 335<br />
22d: 238, 244, 248, 251-52, 257, 484, 494, 501<br />
23d: 86, 92-94, 99-101, 104-06, 109, 115, 117, 122,<br />
123, 140<br />
26th: 86, 113, 113n, 128-34, 313<br />
29th: 437, 561<br />
38th: 103, 108-12, 115-18, 122-24<br />
39th: 134<br />
47th: 102, 133, 134<br />
101st: 521, 544, 546-47, 638-42<br />
104th: 520-23, 541-43, 543n, 544-47, 638-41<br />
109th: 179, 180, 185-87, 206, 213-23, 223n, 224-<br />
26, 227, 229, 231, 234, 236, 255, 258, 483, 488,<br />
500-501, 508, 515-16, 521, 621<br />
110th: 177, 179-92, 192n, 193, 195, 198-99, 205,<br />
208-11, 213, 216, 218, 219, 221, 295-96, 304,<br />
327, 458<br />
112th: 153, 154, 158-59, 179, 187-88, 193-202,<br />
20346, 279, 289-90, 393, 395, 398, 407, 417-21,<br />
583, 598-99, 602-03<br />
117th: 335,337-39, 347-48,360, 363-64, 372, 373,<br />
377<br />
119th: 335-36, 339-45, 349-51, 364-65, 372-73<br />
120th: 335-36, 359, 363, 372, 377<br />
134th: 609, 624, 626, 633, 635<br />
137th: 607, 609, 624-25, 635-37<br />
289th: 587, 591-92, 594-96, 601-03<br />
290th: 388, 594<br />
317th: 517,535-36,538-39<br />
318th: 516-17, 520, 531, 535, 539, 548-50, 550n,<br />
551, 607<br />
319th: 516-19, 535-36. 538-39, 539n, 543-54<br />
320th: 607, 609, 624, 636-37<br />
328th: 264n, 520-23, 541, 543-46, 639, 641-42<br />
329th: 647n<br />
333d: 431,433,436,438-39,575-76<br />
334th: 427, 430-31, 442, 575, 577<br />
335th: 431, 433. 437, 442<br />
345th: 621-22, 643<br />
346th: 622, 643<br />
347th: 643-44<br />
393d: 80, 81, 83, 86, 90, 95-98, 98n, 99, 101,<br />
106, 109, 115, 117, 120, 330<br />
394th: 80-86, 90, 92-93, 95, 97-99, 101, 105-06,<br />
117-18, 120, 330<br />
395th: 79-80, 87-89, 95, 101-02, 107, 109, 112,<br />
117-19, 119n 120, 122<br />
422d: 136n, 138, 141, 145, 151-52, 155-56, 161,<br />
164-71, 282, 289<br />
423d: 136n, 138, 145, 151-52, 154-57, 159, 161,<br />
164-71, 282, 284, 289<br />
424th: 136n 138, 140, 145, 151-54, 156, 158-61,<br />
165, 197, 197n, 203, 205, 273, 279, 284, 285,<br />
Infantry Regiments—Continued<br />
424th—Continued<br />
289, 290, 291, 393, 407, 410, 415-16, 418, 421,<br />
590, 593<br />
Infantry-tank-artillery teams: 124-25, 133, 185, 202,<br />
243, 249, 341, 375, 375, 460-61, 503 552, 625.<br />
See also T<strong>as</strong>k Forces; Teams.<br />
Infiltration: 78, 93, 173, 175, 209, 231-32, 269, 290,<br />
297, 331<br />
Infrared: 178<br />
Ingendorf 226<br />
Inspector General investigations: 136n, 166n, 263-<br />
64, 589n<br />
Intelligence: 50, 157, 252, 255, 288, 292, 401, 511, 614<br />
from captured documents: 401, 527, 624, 667<br />
from civilians: 59, 351, 370<br />
concerning German counterattack intentions: 5-6,<br />
56-57, 57n, 58-61, 61n, 62-63, 74, 80, 152, 180,<br />
239, 333, 496, 668<br />
German: 13, 73-74, 112, 176, 216, 240, 255, 346n<br />
511, 515, 562, 579, 614, 614n<br />
from prisoners: 60-61, 332, 343, 374, 401, 406,<br />
442, 539, 558<br />
from radio and telephone intercept: 73-74, 269,<br />
346n, 378, 449, 482, 666<br />
from rail and vehicular activity: 59, 61-62, 144,<br />
144n, 152, 194, 332<br />
International Highway: 80-83, 95<br />
Irwin, Maj. Gen. S. LeRoy: 489-92,496, 503, 506-08.<br />
See also Infantry Division, 5th.<br />
Irzyk, Maj. Albin: 528<br />
Isle-la-Hesse: 477, 480<br />
Italian front: 3<br />
Ives, Lt. Col. Hiram D.: 536<br />
]abos. See Aircraft, fighter-bombers.<br />
Jackman, 1st Lt. G. W.: 98n<br />
Jacobs, Col. Ben R.: 520<br />
Jameson, Capt. Joseph: 97<br />
Jamodenne: 431<br />
Jansbach Creek: 97<br />
Jaques, Lt. Col. George: 552, 554-55<br />
Jemelle: 425, 433<br />
Jenneville: 622, 645<br />
Jodenville: 620<br />
Jodl, Generaloberst Alfred: 1, 11, 12, 15, 23, 69<br />
75n, 444, 475, 562, 564, 671, 676<br />
and planning for the counteroffensive: 16-17, 19-<br />
21, 23, 27-28 33-35, 173, 212, 443, 665<br />
relationship with Hitler: 11, 16-17, 27<br />
John, Generalleutnant Friedrich: 23<br />
Johnson, Col. Walter M. 335, 373<br />
Jones, Maj. Gen. Alan W.: 138, 140. See also<br />
Infantry Division, 106th.<br />
and St. Vith operations and withdrawal: 205, 273,<br />
275, 276, 279, 285, 288, 289, 290, 294, 395, 407,<br />
412, 413
INDEX 707<br />
Jones, Maj. Gen. Alan W.—Continued<br />
and Schnee Eifel operations and withdrawal: 148,<br />
150, 151, 156, 157, 158, 160, 161, 163, 167, 171,<br />
331<br />
Jones Pvt. J .W.: 218n<br />
Jones, Lt. Col. Robert B.: 397-98<br />
Jordan, Capt. John W.: 349, 596<br />
Joubiéval: 420-21<br />
Jülich: 50, 53, 87<br />
Junglinster: 240-41, 244, 493<br />
Juseret: 553<br />
Kahler, Col. Hans-Joachim: 534<br />
Kaiserslautern: 62<br />
Kalborn: 194-95<br />
Kalkesbach: 497<br />
Kall: 68<br />
Kalterherberg: 87, 134<br />
Kane, Lt. Col. Matthew W.: 354<br />
Karsteter, Lt. Col. Burton W.: 615<br />
K<strong>as</strong>chner, Generalmajor Erwin: 87, 102, 119, 120<br />
K<strong>as</strong>sel: 67<br />
Kaundorf: 547 637-39<br />
Kautenbach: 222-23<br />
Kean, Maj. Gen. William G.: 393, 426, 565-66, 592n<br />
Kehmen: 518-19, 523, 536-38<br />
Keitel, Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm: 1, 11, 12, 19,<br />
19n, 22, 23, 676<br />
Kenan, Lt. Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> A.: 248<br />
Kennedy Lt. Col. Chester E.: 629<br />
Kennedy, Capt. John J.: 113<br />
Kesselring, Generalfeldmarschall Albert: 3<br />
Kesternich: 54, 87<br />
Kilburn, Brig. Gen. Charles S.: 560, 617-18, 621,<br />
644-45. See also Armored Division, 11th.<br />
Kiley, Lieutenant: 514<br />
Kimbro, T/4 Truman: 111<br />
Kingsley, Lt. John A.: 627<br />
Kinnard, Lt. Col. Harry W. O.: 472<br />
Kinney, Lt. Col. R. W.: 523<br />
Kittel, Generalmajor Frederich: 143, 153<br />
Kjeldseth, Lt. Col. Clarion J.: 206<br />
Kleist: 40<br />
Klinck, Lt. Col. Earl F.: 168<br />
Kluge, Generalfeldmarschall Guenther von: 13, 24<br />
Kniess, General der Infanterie Baptist: 212, 533-34,<br />
537, 539<br />
Knives: 115, 336<br />
Koblenz: 42, 45, 59, 64, 65, 662<br />
Kobscheid: 138, 146, 148-50<br />
Kochem: 45<br />
Kokott, Generalmajor Heinz: 177, 180-81, 186, 301,<br />
323-24, 449-50, 450n, 451-52, 458, 463, 465,<br />
470, 474, 476-80, 527, 615, 616<br />
Kolb, Colonel: 641<br />
Kolinski, Sgt. J. C.: 251<br />
Konz: 68<br />
Konzen station: 87-88<br />
Kraemer, Brigadefuehrer der Waffen-SS Fritz: 591<br />
Krag, Maj. Ernst: 601-02<br />
Krebs, General der Infanterie Hans: 21, 22, 26, 33,<br />
672<br />
Krefeld: 23, 53<br />
Kreipe, General der Flieger Werner: 1<br />
Krewinkel: 76, 81, 89, 138, 145-49, 261<br />
Krinkelt. See Rocherath-Krinkelt.<br />
Krueger, Generaloberst Walter: 174, 175 194, 198,<br />
319, 320, 356, 357, 359, 378, 380, 382, 429,<br />
456, 576-77<br />
Kunkel, Major: 324<br />
Kutak, Capt. Frank: 555<br />
Kyll River: 45, 54<br />
Kyllburg: 176<br />
La Fosse: 595<br />
La Gleize: 268, 336-37, 339, 343, 346-49, 351, 359,<br />
363-64, 366, 368-69, 371-73, 375-77, 443, 582n.<br />
592, 597, GOO, 605<br />
La Neuville: 371<br />
La Roche: 44, 46, 287, 291, 316-18, 344, 346, 353-56,<br />
358, 378, 380-82, 393, 400, 431, 433, 647, 662<br />
La Roche-Salmchlteau road. See Highway N28.<br />
Lagrew, Lt. Col. Embrey D.: 633<br />
Lake Balaton: 673<br />
Lamm, 1st Lt. George D.: 419n GOO<br />
Lammerding Generalleutnant Heinz: 583-84, 587,<br />
590, 592, 595, 598<br />
Lammersdorf: 54<br />
Lamormenil: 383, 386, 582, 583, 585-87<br />
Landrecis: 42<br />
Langhaeuser, Generalmajor Rudolf: 195<br />
Lanzerath: 78, 80, 83, 85, 90, 138, 147-50, 260-61,<br />
368<br />
LaPrade, Lt. Col. James L.: 453-54<br />
Larochette (Fels) : 498<br />
L<strong>as</strong>cheid: 175<br />
Lauchert Colonel Meinrad von: 177, 180, 191, 295,<br />
298, 299, 302, 304, 317, 321, 382, 429-30, 437-38,<br />
448, 449, 452, 454, 456, 567-70, 570n<br />
Laudesfeld: 164<br />
Lauer, Maj. Gen. Walter E.: 77, 80, 85, 86, 90, 91,<br />
93, 98, 101, 105, 109, 112, 113, 118, 118, 120.<br />
See also Infantry Division, 99th.<br />
Laughlin, Pfc. O. M.: 550<br />
Lausdorn: 194, 204, 205<br />
Lauterhorn: 241-43, 247, 250-51, 254, 257, 484, 496<br />
Lav<strong>as</strong>elle: 620<br />
Leach, Capt. James H.: 550n<br />
Leake, 1st Lt. John L.: 241, 242, 256<br />
Lee, Lt. Gen. John C. H.: 172, 559<br />
Legler, Maj. Matthew L.: 97, 101<br />
Lkglise: 523<br />
Leidenhorn: 197<br />
Leignon: 435, 568<br />
Leiker, Capt. Victor C.: 232<br />
Leimerdelt draw: 501, 503<br />
Leinen, Pfc. John: 350<br />
Leipzig: 612
708 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Leithum: 205<br />
Lellingen: 187<br />
Leo, 2d Lt. Samuel: 218n<br />
Leonard, Maj. Gen. John W.: 225-27, 230 236.<br />
See also Armored Division, 9th.<br />
Lesse River: 44, 428, 434, 568, 572, 578, 613<br />
L’Homme River: 44, 428, 437, 572, 578<br />
Liaison planes. See Artillery liaison planes.<br />
Libramont: 45, 315, 322, 325, 326, 328, 618<br />
Liefrange: 547, 637-38<br />
Liege :19, 19n, 25, 27-29, 39, 40, 42, 44, 46, 75, 77,<br />
259, 260, 265, 312, 317, 341, 363, 385, 423, 425,<br />
426, 428, 443, 556-57, 560-61, 565-66, 578-79,<br />
589-90, 654-55, 656n, 666, 668, 673<br />
Liege River Belt: 655<br />
Liège-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway (N15) : 268, 345, 352-54,<br />
357, 377, 385, 389, 391-92, 458, 566, 581<br />
Lieler: 187, 194, 196, 204<br />
Lienne Creek: 268, 336, 342, 343, 345, 584, 590, 595<br />
Lierneux: 415<br />
Ligneuville: 261, 264-65, 360-61<br />
Limburg: 77<br />
Lindquist, Col. Roy E.: 581<br />
Lindsey, Capt. Franklin P., Jr.: 415<br />
Lines of communication, German: 272, 292, 339,<br />
342, 348, 351, 367, 369, 373, 393, 422, 517, 519,<br />
533, 540, 595, 606, 644, 662<br />
Lipperscheid: 219<br />
Littlejohn, Brig. Gen. Robert M.: 666<br />
Livarchamps: 607<br />
Llewellyn, 2d Lt. S. D.: 119n<br />
Logistics: 22, 63, 66, 68, 71-73, 661-68, 670. See also<br />
Motor transport: Railroads; Supply.<br />
Lohse, Maj. Leslie A.: 416<br />
Lommersweiler: 285, 292<br />
Longchamps: 455, 462, 478<br />
Longsdorf: 217-18, 220-21, 223<br />
Longvilly: 296304, 313, 315, 317, 328, 448, 449-52,<br />
466<br />
Longvilly-B<strong>as</strong>togne road: 297, 450, 451, 607, 629<br />
Longwy: 20, 45, 487, 512<br />
Lopez, Pfc. Jose M.: 100<br />
Lorraine: 37, 178, 487, 512<br />
Losange: 626-27<br />
Losheim: 83, 92, 139, 150, 260-61, 669<br />
Losheim Gap: 45, 55, 78, 137-40, 142, 150, 260<br />
Losheimergraben: 80-81, 83, 85, 90, 92-94, 129<br />
Losses, summary of. See also C<strong>as</strong>ualties.<br />
Allied November offensive: 37, 51, 55<br />
Ardennes counteroffensive: 674<br />
defense of St. Vith: 421-22<br />
defense of the Sauer River sector: 258<br />
German, 1939-1944: 2, 6<br />
initial attack on the northern shoulder: 123-24<br />
matériel: 224, 376-77, 422, 574, 665, 674<br />
Schnee Eifel encirclement: 170<br />
2d Division operations e<strong>as</strong>t of the Meuse: 574<br />
Losses, Summary of—Continued<br />
28th Division delaying action before B<strong>as</strong>togne:<br />
210-12<br />
Louvain: 426<br />
Lovelady, Lt. Col. William B.: 348<br />
Loveless, Col. Jay B.: 115<br />
Lovio, Capt. Denny J.: 297<br />
Lucht, General der Artillerie Walther: 142-45, 150,<br />
157, 159, 175, 277, 283, 292-93, 396, 401, 404<br />
Luckett, Col. James S.: 246, 253<br />
Ludendorff: 11, 48, 656, 665, 671<br />
Luettwitz, General der Panzertruppen Heinrich<br />
Freiherr von: 174-80, 187, 298, 301, 303-04,<br />
320-21, 323, 429, 436-38, 443, 452, 454, 456,<br />
458-59, 465, 468n, 474-75, 480, 567, 571-72, 574,<br />
614, 6467, 667, 672<br />
Luftwaffe: 1, 18, 19, 22, 63, 64, 72, 142, 178-79,<br />
369, 374, 465, 478, 526, 632, 660, 663, 675<br />
Luftwaffe ground troops: 8, 22, 63, 77, 143, 208,<br />
215, 260<br />
Lullange: 294, 304<br />
Lunéville: 14<br />
Luther, Sgt. H. L.: 636n<br />
Lutrebois: 606, 609, 619, 624-27, 629, 631, 634-35<br />
Lutremange: 623, 625, 627, 635<br />
Lutzkampen: 26, 138, 153, 194-202<br />
Luxembourg: 20, 27, 4346, 238, 249, 257, 425, 488,<br />
490, 512<br />
Luxembourg City: 43-45, 75, 180, 212, 214, 239,<br />
240, 249, 306, 312, 313, 322, 331, 332, 424, 465,<br />
483, 486-90, 493, 511, 515, 607, 611<br />
Luxembourg-Namur highway. See Highway N4.<br />
Luzery: 301, 449, 456<br />
Ma<strong>as</strong>tricht: 29, 53, 75, 274, 556, 561, 603<br />
Mabry, Lt. Col. George: 253, 262n<br />
McAllister, Capt. Reid: 548<br />
McAuliffe, Brig. Gen. Anthony C.: 306, 307, 309.<br />
See also Airborne Division, 101st.<br />
command of B<strong>as</strong>togne sector: 445, 446n, 451,<br />
453-63, 467-68, 471-74, 514, 531, 555, 606-07<br />
reply to B<strong>as</strong>togne surrender ultimatum: 468<br />
McBride, Maj. Gen. Horace L.: 490, 512, 515, 517,<br />
519-20, 535, 537-39. See also Infantry Division,<br />
80th.<br />
McCown, Maj. Hal D.: 343, 365<br />
McCoy, Lt. Col. Jim H.: 214<br />
McDannel, Maj. C. F.: 626<br />
MacDonald, Col. John C.: 441, 571-72<br />
McGarity, Sgt. Vernon: 99n<br />
McGee, Capt. Robert: 106<br />
McGeorge, Maj. K. T.: 348<br />
Machine guns: 88, 128, 141, 224, 273, 408, 436, 665<br />
Machine pistols: 156, 208, 654<br />
Macht, 1st Lt. Walter D.: 340<br />
McIntyre, Capt. Frederick J:: 99<br />
Mackenzie, Col. Alexander J.: 101, 118<br />
McKenzie, Pfc. W. J.: 539
INDEX 709<br />
McKinley, Lt. Col. William D.: 109, 116<br />
McLain, Maj. Gen. Raymond S.: 335<br />
MacSalka, Lt. Col. J. L.: 196<br />
McVickar, Col. Lansing: 516<br />
Mageret: 297, 299-304, 313, 448, 449-52, 454, 630,<br />
632<br />
Magerotte: 644-45<br />
Maisons Lellingen: 251-52<br />
Maldingen: 396, 404, 410, 413, 415<br />
Malempré.: 354, 392, 583, 585-86, 588-90<br />
Malmédy: 42, 44, 45, 130, 163, 260, 261, 264-67,<br />
270, 274, 278, 288, 335-37, 359-61, 363, 369,<br />
374, 376-77, 377n, 395, 401, 413, 605, 610, 611,<br />
660<br />
Malmédy m<strong>as</strong>sacre: 260n, 261, 261n, 262-64<br />
Malscheid: 205<br />
Mande-St. Etienne: 307, 461, 465, 474, 644, 646-47<br />
Manderfeld: 90, 139, 141, 145-50, 280, 368<br />
Manderfeld ridge: 139-40, 148-50<br />
Manhay (crossroads) : 344, 34647, 352-54, 381, 383,<br />
390-92, 443, 566, 581, 583-86, 586n, 587-89,<br />
589n, 590-99, 601, 613<br />
Mannerheim: 10<br />
Manpower, German: 6-9, 28, 63. See also Reinforce-<br />
ments.<br />
Manstein, Generalfeldmarschall Fritz Erich von: 18<br />
Manteuffel, General der Panzertruppen H<strong>as</strong>so-Ec-<br />
card von: 19n, 26, 135, 380, 465, 612n<br />
and the capture of B<strong>as</strong>togne: 475, 475n, 563-64,<br />
613-14, 618-19, 623, 631-32, 647<br />
and the Meuse advance: 293n, 401, 435, 437, 441,<br />
443-44, 454, 459, 564, 564n, 565, 567, 657, 667,<br />
671<br />
and tactical plans for the counteroffensive: 31, 75,<br />
142, 173-76, 178, 180, 269n, 656<br />
Map exercises: 176, 604<br />
Maps: 142, 260, 300<br />
Marche: 42, 45, 321, 378, 379, 382, 427-38, 442,<br />
561, 565, 567, 571, 574-75, 577, 579, 591<br />
Marche plateau: 475, 562, 564, 570, 579<br />
Marche-Hampteau road: 442<br />
Marche-Rochefort road: 176, 436, 438, 440<br />
Marcouray: 381, 384, 387, 593<br />
Markin, 2d Lt. W. D.: 98n<br />
Marloie: 431, 433, 571<br />
Marnach: 181, 183-85, 187-91, 204, 205<br />
Maroney, Maj. William J.: 214<br />
Marquart, Pfc. Floyd P.: 645n<br />
Marshall, General of the <strong>Army</strong> George C.: 56<br />
Marshall, Brig. Gen. S. L. A.: 445n, 450n, 468n,<br />
479, 672<br />
Martelange: 21, 315, 319, 322-23, 327-28, 465, 518,<br />
523, 525-26, 528-29, 533, 540<br />
Martin (Plan): 23, 25-27, 34<br />
Martinez, Capt. Gabriel R.: 550n<br />
Marvie: 299, 451, 457, 462-63, 470-72, 474-75, 623,<br />
635, 642<br />
M<strong>as</strong>pelt: 397<br />
Matthews, Col. Church M.: 280, 280n<br />
Maubeuge: 39, 42<br />
Maucke, Col. Wolfgang: 477, 479<br />
Maurer, Capt. Norman G.: 182<br />
Mayen: 45, 69, 178<br />
Mayes, Maj. J. L.: 149, 281<br />
Means, Pfc. A. G.: 550n<br />
Mechanized forces: 40, 46, 59, 72, 173, 175, 551.<br />
See also Armor.<br />
Mechernich: 68<br />
Medal of Honor: 99n, 100, 110n, 111, 131n, 134n,<br />
362, 375, 387, 403n, 549, 555<br />
Medernach: 232, 234<br />
Medical aid: 99, 106, 166, 167, 168, 182, 223, 234n,<br />
439, 455, 461, 467-68, 609, 668<br />
Medical Battalion, 331st: 166<br />
Melick Farm: 503<br />
Mendez, Lt. Col. Louis G.: 600<br />
Ménil: 576-77<br />
Menzerath: 102<br />
Merlscheid: 147, 665<br />
Mersch: 45, 226, 229, 249<br />
Mersch-Arlon road: 515<br />
Merzig: 508, 516, 518, 520<br />
Metz: 20, 30-31, 36-39, 63, 274, 465, 487-89, 508,<br />
510-12, 520, 560, 606<br />
Metz, Pfc. Edwin W.: 596n<br />
Meuse River: 39, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 53, 259, 423,<br />
428, 434, 509, 556, 617<br />
German attack toward: 264, 264n, 265-67, 293,<br />
298, 342, 368, 374, 381, 429, 435, 437, 440, 442,<br />
443, 449, 454, 456, 459, 465, 475, 560, 562-64,<br />
574, 578, 581, 590, 613, 651<br />
initial counteroffensive objective: 19, 19n, 22, 25,<br />
27, 28, 31, 38, 69, 75, 77, 149, 174, 176-77,<br />
194-95, 556, 670<br />
planned raids to seize crossings: 269, 360-61, 558,<br />
559n<br />
protection of bridges: 433, 443, 557-61, 561n, 566<br />
strengthening of the defense: 426, 443, 482, 556-<br />
63<br />
Meyerode: 162<br />
Michamps: 633<br />
Michelshof: 484-85, 492-94, 496<br />
Michin, Pvt. Bernard: 319n, 450<br />
Middleton, Drew: 675<br />
Middleton, Maj. Gen. Troy H.: 55-56, 488. See<br />
also Corps, VIII.<br />
concern over possible Meuse valley thrust: 556,<br />
560<br />
and defense of B<strong>as</strong>togne: 307, 319, 445-48, 448n,<br />
450, 452, 453, 457-58, 460, 460n, 461, 466, 470,<br />
524, 526<br />
and defense of St. Vith: 205n, 273-75, 288, 290,<br />
400<br />
and delaying actions before B<strong>as</strong>togne: 206, 210n,<br />
225, 294-95, 300, 306-07, 309, 512-13<br />
and initial attacks on VIII Corps front: 157, 158,<br />
187, 190, 202, 236, 241, 295, 310, 312, 330-32<br />
and operations and counterattack on the south-
710 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Middleton, Maj. Gen. Troy H.—Continued<br />
ern shoulder: 243, 244, 249, 250, 607, 615, 617, 621,<br />
627, 630, 646<br />
and preparation of barrier lines: 311-13, 315-17,<br />
322-23, 327, 329<br />
and the Schnee Eifel salient: 140, 161, 167<br />
Mildren, Lt. Col. Frank T.: 109-10<br />
<strong>Military</strong> police: 275, 292, 307, 411<br />
Miller, Lt. Col. A. A,: 358<br />
Miller, Lt. Victor L.: 100<br />
Millikin, Maj. Gen. John.: 510-11, 514, 516, 520,<br />
523-24, 531-32, 544, 627-28, 631, 634, 642. See<br />
also Corps, III.<br />
Mills, 1st Lt. A. L.: 149n<br />
Mills, Pfc. Richard: 119n<br />
Milton, Maj. Harold F.: 181, 209<br />
Miltonberger, Col. Butler B.: 609<br />
Mine fields: 82, 127, 133, 134, 170, 183, 193, 210,<br />
266, 280, 325-26, 349, 368, 375, 518<br />
Mines: 109, 110, 123, 126-27, 141, 198, 226, 268,<br />
313, 316, 318, 322, 450, 503, 551, 643<br />
Model, Generalfeldmarschall Walter: 15, 292, 293n,<br />
401, 411, 437, 443, 474-75, 480, 579n, 580, 585,<br />
603, 604, 605, 643, 647, 672<br />
<strong>as</strong> Commander in Chief West: 13, 24<br />
and the Meuse advance: 563-64, 579, 657, 671,<br />
673, 674<br />
and order to capture B<strong>as</strong>togne: 563, 613, 623, 632<br />
and planning for the counteroffensive: 13, 26-27,<br />
29-36, 38-39, 49, 74, 77, 135n, 173, 212, 656, 661,<br />
666, 670<br />
relationship with Hitler and Rundstedt: 23-24,<br />
24n, 27, 30-31, 564<br />
saves Monschau from destruction: 86, 86n, 89<br />
and use of paratroops: 214-15, 270<br />
Moderscheid: 261<br />
Moehring, Generalleutnant Kurt: 228-29, 231-32,<br />
234-35<br />
Moestroff: 501<br />
Mohnke, SS-Oberfuehrer Wilhelm: 260, 369-70,<br />
373-74, 376<br />
Moircy: 325-26,438, 622,643<br />
Moltke the Elder: 11, 20<br />
Mompach: 240<br />
Monschau: 19, 29, 42, 43, 45, 54, 64, 74, 76-78,<br />
86-89, 102, 103, 119-21, 133, 134, 271, 273,<br />
330, 332, 579, 603-04, 651, 658, 669<br />
Monschau Forest; 54, 78-79<br />
Mont: 303, 449, 451<br />
Mont Rigi: 271<br />
Mont Schumann: 637, 642<br />
Montbtliard: 20<br />
Montgomery, Field Marshal Sir Bernard L.: 53,<br />
333, 411n, 487. See also <strong>Army</strong> Group, 21.<br />
command of Allied forces on the north flank:<br />
411, 413n, 423-24, 426-27, 565-66, 586, 586n,<br />
590, 603<br />
Montgomery, Field Marshal Sir Bernard L.—<br />
Continued<br />
and orders for withdrawal of St. Vith defenders:<br />
411-13, 597<br />
and reinforcement of Meuse defense: 433-34, 443,<br />
557-58, 56061, 561n<br />
and resumption of the offensive: 509, 610, 610n,<br />
612<br />
Monty: 646-47<br />
Moody, Lt. Col. George K.: 490n<br />
Moore, Maj. Norman A.: 83<br />
Morale: 141, 193, 250, 406, 467, 597, 672<br />
Morale, German: 4, 6, 235, 240, 551, 672<br />
Moressée: 431<br />
Morhet: 553, 643-44, 646<br />
Mormont: 596<br />
Morris, Maj. Gen. William H. H., Jr.: 225, 249,<br />
255, 258, 486. See also Armored Division, 10th<br />
Morrow, 1st Lt. Jesse: 111<br />
Mortars: 85, 132, 167, 196, 224, 399, 508<br />
4.2-in: 110<br />
60-mm: 128, 131<br />
81-mm: 89, 97, 110, 182, 224, 541<br />
German: 234, 386<br />
Moselle railroad: 67, 662<br />
Moselle River: 40, 42-46, 55, 64, 74, 213, 238, 240,<br />
487, 496, 549<br />
Motor transport: 5, 72, 305, 657, 664-67, 671<br />
Mud: 115, 126, 129, 164, 178, 222, 243, 252, 261,<br />
281, 299, 336, 407, 410, 416, 417, 454, 527<br />
Muesch: 68<br />
Mullerthal: 231-32, 236, 245-48, 250, 252, 253, 257,<br />
497, 499, 502<br />
Mullins, Sgt. Oscar M.: 596n<br />
Mnnchen-Gladbach: 64, 69<br />
Münshausen: 181, 184-85, 188, 190, 192, 207<br />
Murray, Col. William S.: 607, 636<br />
Mürringen: 86, 93-95, 105-06, 117, 122<br />
Mussolini: 270<br />
Mützenich: 77, 87-88, 102<br />
Nagle, Lt. Col. Frederick W.: 154<br />
Namur: 19, 45, 75, 174, 176, 298, 425, 426, 428-29,<br />
433-34, 443, 556-57, 561, 566<br />
Nancy: 20, 486, 488<br />
Napalm: 470<br />
Napoleon: 10<br />
Nazi party: 8, 31, 76, 128, 623<br />
Nebelwerfer. See Rocket projectors.<br />
Neffe: 300-01, 303-04, 313, 326, 449-52, 456, 458,<br />
462, 463, 475, 623, 629-31<br />
Neffe-Wardin road: 456<br />
Negro troops: 210<br />
Nelson, Col. Gustin M.: 193, 199, 202, 203-05, 290,<br />
420, 583<br />
Nelson, 1st. Lt. Kenneth R.: 362<br />
Nette River: 662<br />
Neubrueck: 410, 414
INDEX 711<br />
Neufchâteau: 21, 40, 45, 46, 212, 288, 315, 322, 323,<br />
328, 400, 433, 457, 458, 465, 466n, 470, 487,<br />
510-11, 524, 552, 617. See also B<strong>as</strong>togne-Neuf-<br />
château. road.<br />
Neuhof: 80, 82, 93, 144<br />
Nidrum: 81<br />
Nieder-Emmels: 402, 406<br />
Niedercolpach: 525<br />
Niederfeulen: 516, 522<br />
Niederwampach: 299<br />
Niederweiss: 68<br />
Night operations: 50, 61, 70-71, 77, 113, 115, 125-26,<br />
178, 191-92, 194, 219, 228, 296, 309, 357, 410,<br />
434, 531, 601, 661<br />
Nikiforov, Col. N.: 676<br />
Nives: 514<br />
Nocher: 193, 208, 640<br />
Norris, Lt. Col. Jack K.: 117<br />
Norway: 3, 15, 195<br />
“Norwegians.” See Infantry Battalion, 99th.<br />
Nothum: 545, 637-38, 64042<br />
November offensive (Allied) : 30, 36-38, 49-50, 51,<br />
54-55, 57, 68-70<br />
Noville: 141, 299, 304, 309, 317-21, 429, 449, 452-56,<br />
463, 472, 474, 647, 649<br />
Noville-B<strong>as</strong>togne road: 301, 449<br />
Nugent, Maj. Gen. Richard E.: 424<br />
Nungesser, Lt. Col. W. L.: 273, 283<br />
“Nuts”: 468<br />
Ny: 594<br />
Ober-Emmels: 396<br />
Oberfeulen: 516<br />
Oberhausen: 196<br />
Oberl<strong>as</strong>cheid: 151, 166-67, 169<br />
Oberwampach: 294, 301<br />
OB WEST: 11, 13, 21, 21n, 22-38, 49, 51, 68, 72-74,<br />
120, 128, 232, 269, 378, 449, 464-65, 482, 562-63,<br />
578, 601, 605, 614, 647, 655, 660, 671-73, 675.<br />
See also Rundstedt, Generalfeldmarschall Gerd<br />
von.<br />
Oberkommando der Luftwaffe (OKL) : 1-2<br />
Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) : 1, 11, 13,<br />
21, 23-24, 27-29, 33-38, 48, 63, 69, 74, 142,<br />
329, 374, 664, 668, 670. See also OKW Reserve.<br />
Oberkomnkando des Heeres (OKH): 1, 11, 40, 66<br />
O’Brien, Lt. Col. Robert E.: 87<br />
Observation: 46, 144, 218, 221, 247, 331, 379. See<br />
also Farward observers.<br />
Obstacles: 82, 83, 88, 138, 144, 146, 159, 162, 186,<br />
194, 196, 197, 198, 222, 253, 266-67, 316, 321,<br />
322, 325-26, 341, 349, 352, 359, 372, 416, 421,<br />
525, 669<br />
Odeigne: 386, 583-84, 587-88, 590, 647<br />
Oden, Lt. Col. Delk: 529<br />
Odrimont: 600<br />
<strong>Of</strong>ficers. See C<strong>as</strong>ualties; Command; Tactical control.<br />
<strong>Of</strong>ficers, German: 143, 173, 177, 232, 240, 436. See<br />
also C<strong>as</strong>ualties; German General Staff.<br />
O’Hara, Lt. Col. James: 451<br />
Oise Intermediate Section: 305, 559<br />
OKW Reserve: 15, 22, 27, 69-71, 178, 332, 444, 474,<br />
521, 533, 614, 667, 671<br />
Operation Alsace: 20<br />
Operation Holland: 20<br />
Operation Liège-Aachen: 20<br />
Operation Lorraine: 20<br />
Operation Luxembourg: 20<br />
Order of battle, Allied: 51, 53-56, 213, 650n<br />
Order of battle, German: 7, 9, 33-37, 63, 69-70,<br />
71, 75-77, 81, 145, 174-75, 212-13, 650n<br />
Ordnance Maintenance Battalion, 129th: 291, 317<br />
Ormont: 144<br />
Orr, Lt. Col. William R.: 354, 383<br />
Ortheuville: 44, 318-21, 323, 325, 357, 429, 435, 458<br />
Ortho: 317<br />
Osterberg, Pfc. N. A.: 471n<br />
Osweiler: 241, 243, 245, 248, 251-52, 254, 257, 484,<br />
492, 496<br />
Oubourcy: 633<br />
Ouellette, Maj. Albert A.: 170<br />
Ouffet: 265<br />
Our River: 44, 46, 55, 137, 146, 149, 156, 157, 161,<br />
166-67, 179, 192, 194,272, 289, 331, 356, 398, 546<br />
Our River crossings: 137, 141, 142, 143, 148, 149,<br />
158-60, 166, 174-80, 183, 185, 187, 195-98, 202,<br />
203-04, 213-22, 279, 284, 314, 534-35, 657<br />
Ouren: 174, 195-96, 198-202, 203-04<br />
Ourthe River: 42, 44, 46, 259, 287, 316, 326, 344,<br />
353, 379, 380, 385, 387, 389, 428, 433, 435,<br />
437, 564, 565, 567, 574, 580, 613-14, 621. See<br />
also Salm-Ourthe sector.<br />
Ourthe River crossings: 25, 308, 315, 316-21, 326,<br />
355-57, 371, 378, 380, 382, 429-30, 433, 441, 577-<br />
79, 581, 591, 617<br />
Paderborn: 271<br />
Palatinate: 49, 58<br />
Palladino, Lt. Col. Ralph A,: 520-21, 546-47<br />
Palmaccio, 1st Lt. Charles P.: 474<br />
Palmer, Brig. Gen. Williston B.: 565-66<br />
Panel markers: 592n<br />
Panic: 106, 116, 361, 377, 405<br />
Panther tanks. See Tanks, German.<br />
Panzerfausts: 231, 234, 365, 644. See also Bazook<strong>as</strong>.<br />
Parachute Field Artillery Battalion, 456th: 370<br />
Parachute Field Artillery Battalion, 463d: 479<br />
Parachute Infantry Battalion, 509th: 385, 392, 602<br />
Parachute Infantry Regiments<br />
501st: 303, 307, 309, 319, 445-48, 449-56, 459,<br />
462-63, 465<br />
502d: 307, 455, 462, 472, 478-79, 645, 645n<br />
504th: 345-46, 351-52, 366-67, 581<br />
505th: 345-46, 351-52, 370-71, 373-74, 397, 581,<br />
599-600<br />
506th: 307, 453, 455-56, 462-63, 472, 630<br />
508th: 346, 419n, 420-21, 581, 600<br />
517th: 379, 381-82, 384-85, 594, 597
712 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Parapacks: 172, 468, 609<br />
Paratroops, German: 214-15, 264n, 269-71, 271n,<br />
312, 558, 623<br />
Parc Hotel (Berdorf) : 242, 247, 250, 256<br />
Paris: 332, 424, 556, 559<br />
Parker, Maj. Arthur C. 111: 357, 389, 390<br />
Parker, Lt. Harry: 97<br />
Parker, Col. Hugh C.: 431<br />
Parker, 1st Lt. R. A.: 117n<br />
“Parker’s Crossroads.” See Baraque de Fraiture.<br />
Patch, Lt. Gen. Alexander M.: 53<br />
Pathfinder teams: 468<br />
Paton, Lt. Col. Walter J.: 328-29, 466<br />
Patrols: 51, 80, 138, 144, 179, 194, 215, 216, 235,<br />
389, 390<br />
Patton, Lt. Gen. George S., Jr.: 14, 31, 55, 255,<br />
485, 490, 513, 532, 560. See also <strong>Army</strong>, Third.<br />
and “around the clock” attack to B<strong>as</strong>togne: 475,<br />
526, 526n, 531<br />
and request for Third <strong>Army</strong> <strong>as</strong>sistance: 331, 333,<br />
334, 457, 486-89<br />
and Rhine crossing <strong>as</strong> objective: 333, 485, 510, 613<br />
and Third <strong>Army</strong> counterattacks: 327, 509-10,<br />
515-16, 524-26, 539, 606n, 607, 611-12, 614-15,<br />
627, 652<br />
Paul, Lt. Col. Donald: 181, 184<br />
Paul, Maj. Gen. Willard S.: 511-12, 521-23, 541-42,<br />
544, 637-42. See also Infantry Division, 26th.<br />
Peale, Lt. Col. James N.: 546<br />
Pedley, Col. Timothy A., Jr.: 431, 576<br />
Peer, 1st Lt. E. L.: 221<br />
Peiper, Obersturmbannfuehrer Joachim: 90, 260-<br />
61, 261n, 262-69, 337, 339-40, 342, 964, 365,<br />
367, 373, 376, 377, 600, 667<br />
Pennington, 2d Lt. G. F.: 638n<br />
Pessoux: 441<br />
Petit Coo: 375<br />
Petit Han: 594<br />
Petit Thier: 282, 286<br />
Petite Trisogne: 569<br />
Phantom: 411n, 586n<br />
Phelps, Sgt. Donald: 575<br />
Philbeck, Maj. <strong>To</strong>mmie M.: 233<br />
Phillips, Sgt. Webster: 625<br />
Photo Reconnaissance Group, 10th: 61<br />
Photo Reconnaissance Squadron, 30th: 61<br />
Piburn, Brig. Gen. Edwin W.: 249<br />
Piersall, Sgt. T. E.: 119n<br />
Pillboxes: 199, 203-04<br />
Pinsamont: 466n, 644-45<br />
Pironprk: 643-44<br />
Plank, Brig. Gen. Ewart C.: 561<br />
Plankers, 1st Lt. Dewey: 92-93<br />
Planning, German: 19-36, 38,46, 75, 173-76, 194-95,<br />
212-13, 269-72, 656-57, 665-71. See also Hitler,<br />
Adolf; Strategy; Tactical plans.<br />
Plateau des Tailles: 44<br />
POL (petroleum, oil, and lubricants): 22, 38, 64-65,<br />
68, 72-73, 113, 260, 261, 265, 266-67, 358, 359,<br />
POL (petroleum, oil, and lubricants) —Continued<br />
374, 378, 468, 666-67. See also Shortages.<br />
Pont: 280, 401<br />
Pope, Lt. Col. Lemuel E.: 572-73<br />
Poteau: 279-82, 285-86, 290, 314, 393, 397, 407-09,<br />
418-19<br />
Poteau-Vielsalm highway: 409, 413, 416, 418<br />
POZIT fuze. See Proximity fuze.<br />
Pratz: 520<br />
Presidential citation. See Distinguished Unit Cita-<br />
tion.<br />
Presser, Pvt. R. L.: 638n<br />
Prickett, Maj. Gen. Fay B.: 594<br />
Priess, Generalleutnant der Waffen-SS Herman:<br />
76, 121, 369, 374, 631-32<br />
Prisoners<br />
captured American: 170, 261, 325, 377, 403, 404<br />
captured German: 197, 203, 226, 258, 286. 377,<br />
399, 503, 506, 555, 570, 574, 577, 609<br />
orders to shoot: 261, 261n, 262, 262n, 263-64, 264n<br />
Pronsfeld: 137, 141, 143, 154<br />
Propaganda: 8, 12, 240, 674, 676<br />
Proximity fuze: 361, 363, 375, 501, 504, 626, 654-56,<br />
656n<br />
Prüm: 45, 68, 137, 141, 143, 293, 403, 611<br />
Prüm River: 45, 613<br />
Prümerherg: 405<br />
Puett, Lt. Col. Joseph F.: 156, 165, 167<br />
Putscheid: 215<br />
Quarterm<strong>as</strong>ter Truck Company, 3967th: 358<br />
Quatre-Vents: 530<br />
Quesada, Maj. Gen. Elwood R.: 424<br />
Radio Luxembourg: 240<br />
Radios: 89, 96, 101, 117, 147, 154, 181, 184, 209,<br />
221, 240-41, 242-43, 249, 252, 254, 289, 332, 341,<br />
369, 386, 434, 461, 602, 633, 654. See also<br />
Intelligence.<br />
Radscheid: 165, 167<br />
Rahier: 346<br />
Raids. See Sabotage.<br />
Railroads: 5, 40, 4243, 61-62, 64-69, 660-63, 665,<br />
668<br />
Ralingen: 240<br />
Rambrouch: 521, 521n<br />
Rammeldange: 490, 490n<br />
Ramscheid: 97<br />
Rath Hill: 112<br />
Rations: 250, 668. See also Supply.<br />
Rau, 2d Lt. Frederick: 550n<br />
Read, Col. George: 628-29<br />
Rechrival: 621, 644, 646<br />
Recht: 163, 272, 274, 279-81, 283, 285, 291, 339, 359,<br />
369, 393, 397, 407-09, 418, 458<br />
Recogne: 327, 463, 475
INDEX 713<br />
Reconnaissance Troops<br />
4th: 244-45<br />
26th: 520-21<br />
28th: 206<br />
30th: 335<br />
83d: 353<br />
99th: 79, 134<br />
106th: 136n, 138, 151, 165-66<br />
Red Cross: 461, 537<br />
Reed, Col. Charles H.: 499<br />
Reeves, Sgt. Woodrow W.: 149n<br />
Regné.: 584-85<br />
Reichsbahn (German State Railroads). See Rail-<br />
roads.<br />
Reid, Col. Alexander D.: 138, 153, 158-60<br />
Reims: 14, 305, 424, 556-57, 618<br />
Reineke, Sgt. E. T.: 575<br />
Reinforcements: 55, 86, 129, 134, 157, 193, 214, 239,<br />
243,266, 269, 288-89, 312, 327, 332-34, 369, 460,<br />
482, 511-13, 556-57, 674<br />
Reinforcements, German: 22, 37-38, 77, 177-78, 239,<br />
272, 339, 401, 494-95, 533<br />
Reisdorf: 220, 231<br />
Remagen: 67, 69<br />
Remagne: 614, 621, 643<br />
Remer, Col. Otto: 292, 292n, 293, 293n, 396, 402,<br />
404, 407-09, 417, 584-85, 613-14, 619-20, 645-46<br />
Remichampagne: 553, 633<br />
Remonfosse: 459, 624<br />
Remonville: 552<br />
Remouchamps: 336<br />
Rendulic, Generaloberst Dr. Lothar: 3<br />
Replacements. See Reinforcements.<br />
Reserves: 56, 73, 244, 295, 310-11, 313, 331, 332,<br />
405, 420, 424, 427, 670-71. See also SHAEF<br />
Reserve.<br />
Reserves, German: 36, 37, 38, 58, 68, 251, 277, 278,<br />
671. See also OKW Reserve.<br />
Reuland: 490<br />
Reuler: 185, 189-91<br />
Rhea, Lt. Col. Robert L.: 406, 589-90<br />
Rheinbach: 68<br />
Rheydt: 50<br />
Rhine River: 15, 21, 30, 39, 40, 45, 50, 51, 57, 64-68,<br />
255, 333, 485, 486, 510, 557, 610, 613, 648, 662<br />
Rice Maj. Herman R., Jr.: 243<br />
Richardson, Lt. Col. Walter B.: 391, 392<br />
Richthofen: 39-40<br />
Ridge 536: 168<br />
Ridgway, Maj. Gen. Matthew B.: 305-07, 365-66.<br />
See also Corps, XVIII (Airborne).<br />
and operations on northwest front of First <strong>Army</strong>:<br />
346, 366, 371, 376, 377, 379, 382, 385, 392, 395,<br />
401, 432-33, 583, 585, 590, 592-93, 597, 603,<br />
612<br />
resumes command of XVIII Airborne Corps: 344<br />
and St. Vith withdrawal: 406-07, 412-13<br />
Riggs, Lt. Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> J.. Jr.: 405<br />
Riley, Col. Don: 80, 86, 95, 105<br />
Riley, Lt. Col. J. R.: 250, 257<br />
Riley, Col. Lowell M.: 630, 632<br />
Rimmer, Sgt. George P.: 630n<br />
Ringel: 536, 538-39<br />
Ringel Hill: 535, 538-39<br />
Ringhuscheid: 180<br />
River crossings. See Bridges; Bridging; Ferry opera-<br />
tions; Fords; rivers by name.<br />
Roadblocks: 235, 253, 265, 266-67, 282, 291, 294-300,<br />
304, 307, 317, 323, 324, 325, 341-42, 348, 354,<br />
356, 359, 360, 361, 364, 382, 389, 392, 397, 408,<br />
432, 445, 451, 452, 462, 466, 474. See also Bar-<br />
rier lines; Obstacles.<br />
Roads and road nets: 42, 45, 51, 78, 80-81, 120-21,<br />
128, 137, 141, 176, 179-80, 187, 194, 258, 260,<br />
261, 267, 272, 280, 292, 306, 378, 389, 403, 407,<br />
411, 412, 440, 445, 459, 509-11, 520, 540-41, 611,<br />
657, 665, 670. See also Ardennes; Mud; Terrain.<br />
Robb, Air Marshal James M.: 424n<br />
Roberts, Cpl. Charles: 110<br />
Roberts, Col. William: 300, 303, 309, 451-52, 454-55,<br />
457, 460-61, 466, 468, 473, 474-75, 514<br />
Robertson, Maj. Gen. Walter M.: 99, 101-04, 107,<br />
107n, 108-09, 112, 118, 120, 125, 139, 140. See<br />
also Infantry Division, 2d.<br />
Robertville: 113<br />
Rochefort: 42, 44, 45, 428, 432-40, 442, 561, 567,<br />
569-72, 574, 579, 613, 647, 647n<br />
Rocherath-Krinkelt: 78-79, 81, 86, 94-96, 98-102,<br />
104-113, 115-29, 131, 133, 134, 270, 369, 603, 604<br />
Rocket projectors: 19, 22, 70-72, 507, 652-53, 657<br />
Rodenhof: 484<br />
Roder: 175<br />
Rodt: 402, 407-09, 412, 416-18<br />
Roer River dams: 53, 63, 78-79, 140, 158, 273-74<br />
Roer River sector: 40, 53, 58, 62, 68, 69, 70, 71, 73,<br />
129, 269, 333, 334, 427, 664<br />
Roermond: 25, 26, 64<br />
Roffe, Col. A. Worrell: 497, 504<br />
Rogers, Sergeant: 569<br />
Rogery: 418-19<br />
Rohren: 87, 89, 119<br />
Rolle: 478<br />
Rollesbroich: 54<br />
Rondu: 621<br />
Rosborough, Lt. Col. James C.: 221<br />
Rose, Pfc. F. S.: 574n<br />
Rose, Capt. L. K.: 295, 296<br />
Rose, Maj. Gen. Maurice: 346, 353-54, 377, 379,<br />
382, 385-88, 390-91, 442, 582, 592. See also<br />
Armored Division, 3d.<br />
Rosebaum, Col. Dwight A.: 286,409,585-87<br />
Rosenthal, Pfc. Paul C.: 153, 197n<br />
Rossignol: 555<br />
Rotation of troops: 238-39<br />
Rötgen: 77, 431<br />
Roth: 137, 138, 141, 143, 146, 148-50, 155, 215, 217,<br />
221, 534
714 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Rothkirch, General der Kavallerie Edwin Graf von:<br />
328, 637<br />
Roullingen: 640-42<br />
Royal Air Force: 65, 485, 660-62<br />
Group 83: 569<br />
2d Tactical Air Force: 424, 661<br />
“Rubber duck” operation: 73<br />
Rubel, Lt. Col. George K.: 342<br />
Rudder, Lt. Col. James E.: 214, 217-20, 223, 225-26<br />
Ruhr: 12, 17, 18, 21, 25, 36, 49, 53, 58<br />
Rumanian forces: 2<br />
Rumors: 61, 108, 257, 263-64, 280, 296, 316, 320, 327,<br />
345, 356, 363, 374, 377, 493n, 520, 558-59, 561<br />
Rundstedt, Generalfeldmarschall Gerd von: 3, 11,<br />
15, 19n, 21, 58, 443, 605. See also OB WEST.<br />
and fear of Allied air intelligence: 61, 73<br />
order to capture B<strong>as</strong>togne: 464-65, 613-14, 647<br />
and the Meuse advance: 563-64, 579, 670, 673, 674<br />
and planning for the counteroffensive: 20, 23-31,<br />
33-38, 49, 57, 69, 74, 135n<br />
recalled <strong>as</strong> Commander in Chief West: 14, 23-24<br />
relationship with Hitler and German General<br />
Staff: 14, 19-20, 23-24, 24n, 27-31, 33, 564, 647,<br />
671, 675<br />
reputation <strong>as</strong> a soldier: 23, 57-58<br />
“Rundstedt <strong>Of</strong>fensive”: 20<br />
Rush, Pfc. W. S.: 198n<br />
Ryan, Col. John L., Jr.: 280n, 282, 400, 413<br />
Ryerson, Capt. William F.: 300-303, 448, 454<br />
Saar River sector: 51, 62, 482, 485-87, 489, 513, 618<br />
Saarbrucken: 36<br />
Saarlautern: 488-89<br />
Sabotage: 269, 461, 558-59, 559n, 561<br />
“Sad Sack Affair”: 601<br />
Sadzot: 601-02<br />
Sag<strong>as</strong>er, Maj. Wray F.: 620<br />
Sainlez: 607<br />
St. Avold: 512<br />
St. Hubert: 319, 321, 322, 325-26, 329, 382, 400, 428,<br />
433, 437, 459, 487, 622, 643, 647<br />
St. Trond: 426<br />
St. Vith: 487, 510, 515, 580, 605, 611-12, 627, 662<br />
accomplishments and losses of the defenders: 422<br />
artillery support: 277, 279, 283, 291, 396, 398-402,<br />
417<br />
capture important to German plans: 142, 143,<br />
152, 175, 272, 277-78, 401-04, 580, 670<br />
capture of and withdrawal operations: 385, 392,<br />
405-13, 417, 421, 443, 581, 582, 585, 593, 597,<br />
598-99<br />
command post of 106th Division: 148, 152, 158,<br />
161, 164, 171, 281, 285, 331<br />
delaying actions before: 160, 163-64, 166, 171, 273,<br />
275, 277, 306, 316, 389<br />
German occupation of: 407, 410-11, 414, 417, 421<br />
initial attack, and perimeter defense: 193, 205,<br />
265, 272-73, 279-92, 306, 329, 366, 371, 393, 395,<br />
396-405, 423, 480<br />
St. Vith—Continued<br />
initial reinforcements sent: 158, 159, 273, 274-79,<br />
288-89, 369<br />
location and tactical importance: 42, 44, 45, 46,<br />
137, 141, 205n, 272, 312, 458<br />
traffic control problems: 158, 164, 275-77, 279,<br />
281, 292<br />
St. Vith–B<strong>as</strong>togne highway. See Highway N12.<br />
St. Vith–Diekirch highway: 179, 181-82, 184-85, 188,<br />
192, 219<br />
St. Vith–La Roche highway. See Highway N28.<br />
St. Vith–Schonberg road: 150, 156, 157, 162, 167,<br />
272-73, 275, 277, 279, 283, 292, 332, 396, 403-05<br />
St. Vith–Vielsalm road: 164, 286, 292, 402, 407, 409,<br />
417<br />
Salle: 319, 321<br />
Salm River: 44, 259<br />
Salm River crossings: 267, 268, 336, 344, 347, 352,<br />
367, 369, 370, 373, 376, 377, 401, 407, 409, 412-<br />
13, 415-17, 419-21, 578-79, 581, 590, 595, 597,<br />
599-600, 604<br />
Salm-Ourthe sector: 580-81, 590-91, 599, 601, 603<br />
Salmchlteau: 287, 357, 359, 412, 413, 415-21, 581,<br />
584, 598-99, 601<br />
Sambre River: 428<br />
Samrée: 353-54, 356-59, 377-78, 380-82, 389, 397,<br />
399, 400, 401, 429<br />
Sart-lez-St. Vith: 402<br />
Sauer River: 44, 46, 55, 234, 238, 240, 243, 256, 257,<br />
485, 488, 532, 539<br />
Sauer River crossings: 213, 214, 216, 218, 220, 224,<br />
225, 227, 229-30, 232, 236, 241-42, 245, 249, 252,<br />
258, 470, 491, 495, 500, 504-06, 508, 535, 537-40,<br />
613, 672<br />
Sauer-Moselle sector: 492-508<br />
Sauer-Our triangle sector: 214, 216, 218, 220-22,<br />
227-30<br />
Savelborn: 232-34, 494, 496<br />
Saverne Gap: 37, 50, 53<br />
Savy: 480<br />
Sawmills: 267, 312, 313, 318<br />
Schalles, Capt. John W.: 231n<br />
Scheidel: 538<br />
Scheidgen: 245, 247-52, 254,484-85, 491-92, 497, 501<br />
Schelde estuary: 25<br />
Schieren: 488<br />
Schlammbach: 240<br />
Schlausenbach: 151, 155-56, 166<br />
Schleiden : 68<br />
Schlieffen: 11, 13, 39-40, 170<br />
Schmidt: 193<br />
Schmidt, Generalmajor Erich: 215, 225, 516<br />
Schnee Eifel: 40, 42, 45, 55-56, 136-45, 151, 154-55,<br />
157, 161, 165-66, 168, 170-71, 175, 260, 272, 275,<br />
283, 284, 292, 389, 411<br />
Schonberg: 141-43, 150, 156-59, 162-70, 272, 275,<br />
277, 283, 285, 289, 292
INDEX 715<br />
Schoppen: 81, 91, 133, 261<br />
Schramm, Maj. Percy E.: 16, 20<br />
Schroeder, Lt. Col. Frederic: 393<br />
Schumann crossroads: 640<br />
Schuster, Dr.: 22<br />
Schwartz, Sgt. I. R.: 132n<br />
Schwarz Erntz gorge: 229-32, 245, 249-50, 252-53,<br />
494-97, 499<br />
Scott, Lt. Col. Jean D.: 95, 99<br />
Scott, Maj. W. J.: 278<br />
Scott, Col. Walter T.: 546, 641<br />
Scratch forces. See Defense.<br />
Seamon, Pvt.: 340<br />
Searchlights: 61-62, 82, 89, 96, 126, 156, 159, 195-96,<br />
196n, 199, 209, 225, 245, 301, 654-55, 657<br />
Sedan: 327, 428, 556, 560<br />
Seeley, Lt. Col. George W.: 160<br />
Seitz, Col. John F. R.: 113<br />
Semois River: 21, 42, 44, 75, 327, 560<br />
Senonchamps: 324-25, 464, 466, 468, 470-71, 475,<br />
477, 616, 619, 646<br />
Sensfuss, Generalmajor Franz: 239, 248, 257, 494,<br />
499-500<br />
Seny: 265<br />
Setz: 275, 277, 292<br />
Sevenig: 194-96, 198-99, 398<br />
SHAEF. See Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expedi-<br />
tionary Forces.<br />
SHAEF Reserve: 305-06, 333-34, 336, 611-12, 618<br />
Shanley, Lt. Col. Thom<strong>as</strong>: 600<br />
Shay, Sgt. M. N.: 300n<br />
Sherburne, Col. Thom<strong>as</strong> L., Jr.: 307<br />
Sherman tanks. See Tanks, medium.<br />
Shinn, Capt. Roger L.: 231n<br />
Shipley, Lt. Col. Alden: 501<br />
Shortages<br />
ammunition: 141, 166, 168, 184-85, 188, 192, 208-<br />
09, 219, 220, 341, 467<br />
antitank mines: 141, 664<br />
BAR’S: 129<br />
bazooka rounds: 141, 664<br />
g<strong>as</strong>oline: 208, 224, 384, 387<br />
grenade launchers: 129<br />
medical supplies: 166, 384, 467<br />
medium tanks: 513<br />
rations: 166, 220<br />
replacements: 239, 332, 513<br />
tank crews: 513<br />
Shortages, German<br />
ammunition: 1, 68, 72-73, 258, 369, 531, 595, 664<br />
antitank guns: 72<br />
<strong>as</strong>sault guns: 77, 654<br />
bridging equipment: 222, 226, 235, 258, 357<br />
engineers and equipment: 72, 77<br />
heavy weapons: 1, 215, 247, 258<br />
POL: 63, 64, 72-73, 204, 267, 271, 321, 338-39,<br />
342, 348, 367-69, 390, 420, 429, 435, 442, 564,<br />
568-69, 583, 664, 667<br />
prime movers: 72, 657<br />
Shortages, German—Continued<br />
signal equipment: 72, 215<br />
spare parts: 72, 664<br />
tank retrievers: 72, 664<br />
tanks: 1, 664<br />
transport: 72, 178, 195, 214, 657, 664-67, 671<br />
Sibret: 208-09, 322-25, 327-28, 454, 457, 459, 464,<br />
465, 553-54, 613, 615-16, 619-20, 645<br />
Sierck: 44<br />
Silesia: 12<br />
Simmerath: 25, 77, 90<br />
Simpson, Lt. Gen. William H.: 53, 305, 333-34, 424,<br />
427. See also <strong>Army</strong>, Ninth.<br />
Sink, Col. Robert F.: 307, 453, 463<br />
Sinzig: 45<br />
Sittard: 28, 29<br />
Skaggs, Col. Leland W.: 123<br />
Skorzeny, Lt. Col. Otto: 270, 270n, 360-61, 363<br />
“Skyline Drive”. See St. Vith–Diekirch highway.<br />
Slayden, Lt. Col. W. M.: 158, 273<br />
Small arms: 128, 197, 210, 224, 242, 350, 379, 551,<br />
654<br />
“Small Solution”: 27-28, 30-31, 38, 613<br />
Smith, Col. Dougl<strong>as</strong> B.: 591<br />
Smith, Pfc. R. D.: 98n<br />
Smith, Capt. Robert W.: 538n<br />
Smith, Lt. Gen. Walter Bedell: 306, 423-24, 611-12<br />
Smoke, tactical use of: 83, 102, 110, 134, 168, 223,<br />
250, 284, 295, 365, 383, 439, 497, 503, 528, 584,<br />
633<br />
Snoad, T/Sgt. Russell N.: 375<br />
Soderman, Pfc. William A.: 110n<br />
Solis, Maj. Paul J.: 266<br />
Sonne: 462<br />
Sorinne: 568<br />
Soviet offensives: 2-3, 7, 12, 38, 57, 675-76<br />
SOY: 353, 378-81, 384-85, 386, 581<br />
Soy-Hotton road: 378-79, 381-84, 386, 441, 582, 585,<br />
593-94, 598<br />
Spa: 42, 44, 259, 260, 265, 268, 307, 331, 336, 341-42,<br />
348, 349, 351, 385, 393, 424, 667, 670<br />
Spaatz, General Carl: 377n<br />
Special Air Services (British) : 557<br />
Special troops: 73<br />
Speer Reich Minister Albert: 4, 5, 9, 13<br />
Spriggs, Capt. Robert E.: 318<br />
Sprimont: 320, 341<br />
SS troops: 75-76, 108, 135, 263-64, 264n, 411, 520,<br />
623, 668<br />
Stadtkyll: 68, 144, 272<br />
Stalin: 676<br />
Standish, Lt. Col. Miles L.: 250<br />
Statler, Cpl. C. E.: 149n<br />
Stavelot: 47, 260, 264-68, 274, 278, 280, 335-39, 347-<br />
48, 351, 359-61, 363-64, 368, 369, 374, 376, 395,<br />
401, 581, 660, 667, 670<br />
Stegen: 226, 234, 236<br />
Steinbach: 315
716 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Steinebriick: 141-43, 151, 153, 155, 158-60, 279, 284-<br />
85, 292<br />
Stephens, Col. Richard W.: 339, 341<br />
Ster: 372<br />
Stokes, Col. John H., Jr.: 107, 122<br />
Stolzembourg: 177, 213, 215<br />
Stone, Lt. Col. Robert O.: 286, 398-99<br />
Stoumont: 128, 268, 336, 339-43, 346-49, 351, 359,<br />
363-66, 368-69, 371-74, 377<br />
Stoumont Station: 341-42<br />
Stragglers. See Defense, scratch forces.<br />
Str<strong>as</strong>bourg: 51<br />
Strategy, Allied: 48, 51, 58, 605<br />
bulge containment doctrine: 334, 480, 611<br />
controversy re Rhineland drive: 53, 610, 610n<br />
transportation vs. oil <strong>as</strong> air targets: 65<br />
Strategy, German: 170. See also Planning.<br />
strategic surprise: 48, 51, 330, 668<br />
war on two fronts: 11-13, 28, 38, 675-76<br />
Strickler, Col. Daniel: 193, 208, 209, 209n<br />
Strong, Maj. Gen. Kenneth W. D.: 423, 509<br />
Student, Generaloberst Kurt: 208<br />
Sugg, Col. Dougl<strong>as</strong>: 622<br />
Supply: 3, 461, 560, 665-66. See also Air supply;<br />
Ammunition; Lines of communication; Logis-<br />
tics; POL; Shortages.<br />
depots and dumps: 113, 152, 259-60, 265, 266,<br />
286, 355-58, 398-99, 666<br />
German: 255-56, 321, 495, 665<br />
rationing: 399-401<br />
resupply problems: 141, 194, 222, 235, 370, 407,<br />
412<br />
Supreme Allied Commander. See Eisenhower, Gen.<br />
Dwight D.<br />
Supreme Headquarters, Allied Expeditionary<br />
Forces (SHAEF): 58, 62, 63, 65, 171-72, 423, 509,<br />
55657, 610-11, 673. See also Eisenhower, Gen.<br />
Dwight D.; SHAEF Reserve.<br />
Sure River: 44, 322, 331, 501, 508, 510, 520<br />
Sure River crossings: 215, 517-18, 521-23, 525-26,<br />
532-33, 535-47, 606-07, 627-28, 636, 637-38, 642,<br />
659, 669<br />
Surprise (tactical) : 19, 143, 145, 176, 180, 182, 195-<br />
96, 241, 242, 248-49, 251, 264-65, 269, 391, 402-<br />
03, 434, 477, 516, 624. See also Strategy,<br />
German.<br />
Surré.: 607<br />
Surrender operations: 149, 166, 168, 170, 192, 193,<br />
257<br />
Surrender ultimatums: 183, 387, 468<br />
Susteren: 29<br />
Sutherland, Col. Edward M.: 336, 339-42<br />
Sutton, Lt. Col. Richard D.: 643<br />
Swift, Capt. Vaughn: 543<br />
Symbol, Lt. Col. Paul H.: 325, 456<br />
Tabets, Lt. Col. Sam: 319, 450<br />
Tactical Air Commands<br />
IX: 61, 171, 337, 424, 568, 592n, 660-61<br />
XIX: 61, 424, 474, 496, 526, 625, 634, 661<br />
XXIX: 337, 424, 661<br />
Tactical control: 91, 99, 111, 117-18, 166, 168, 196,<br />
208-09, 289, 297, 304, 411, 419, 425, 492, 497-98,<br />
589<br />
Tactical plans: 139-40, 385, 423, 427, 487, 493, 509-<br />
12, 515, 611-12, 612n<br />
Tactical plans, German: 86-87, 95-96, 128, 142-45,<br />
152, 156-57, 177-79, 195, 198, 214-15, 229, 240,<br />
292-93, 323-24, 381-82, 401-04, 476-77, 581<br />
Tactical Reconnaissance Group, 67th: 61-62<br />
Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron, 109th : 337<br />
Tactics, German. See also Infiltration; Sabotage.<br />
armored vs. infantry spearheads: 76-77, 81, 122,<br />
177<br />
byp<strong>as</strong>s of defended towns: 175-76, 181, 186, 209,<br />
215, 216, 258<br />
close formation and frontal attacks: 197, 199, 211,<br />
397<br />
disregard for flank security: 175-76, 212-13, 264,<br />
322, 369, 380, 437-38, 475, 578-79<br />
penetration along boundary lines: 198, 330, 388,<br />
442, 659<br />
piecemeal troop employment: 277, 331, 348, 401,<br />
456, 574<br />
Tadler: 518, 536, 538<br />
Tandel: 217-18, 220, 223<br />
Tank Battalions<br />
2d: 190, 294-96, 298n<br />
3d: 300, 303<br />
8th: 513-14, 526, 548<br />
9th: 528<br />
14th: 159-60, 283, 392, 585<br />
15th: 633<br />
17th: 279-80, 291, 406<br />
19th: 230-31, 233, 244, 245, 248, 616n<br />
22d: 620<br />
31st: 282-83, 406<br />
35th: 529, 627<br />
37th: 530, 552, 554-55<br />
40th: 286, 291, 588<br />
41st: 620<br />
42d: 621<br />
68th: 630, 632-33<br />
69th: 629-30, 632<br />
70th: 239, 243, 245-47, 258, 485n<br />
702d: 518<br />
707th: 182, 184-91, 199, 206-08, 217-20, 222, 313<br />
735th: 489, 521, 523<br />
737th: 497, 503<br />
740th: 341-42, 349, 360, 365, 372<br />
741s: 100, 113n, 115-16, 123, 125<br />
743d: 338, 340-41, 363<br />
745th: 113n<br />
771st: 431, 442, 575
INDEX 717<br />
Tank Destroyer Battalions<br />
602d: 327<br />
609th: 452, 471, 474<br />
612th: 87, 91, 113, 115, 119<br />
613th: 133<br />
629th: 596n<br />
630th: 181, 183, 191, 199, 206, 218,221,296, 323-24<br />
634th: 113n, 132<br />
638th: 437<br />
643d: 384, 390<br />
644th: 91, 104. 109, 111, 115, 123, 126<br />
654th: 626<br />
701st: 627<br />
703d: 113n<br />
704th: 551<br />
705th: 308-09, 317-19, 453, 455, 456, 458, 460, 472,<br />
474,479<br />
801st: 91, 94, 113n, 115, 126<br />
802d: 239<br />
803d: 239, 246<br />
811th: 159, 199, 230-31, 283, 298, 301-02<br />
814th: 287, 396-97, 405<br />
818th: 489, 523<br />
820th: 136n, 138, 140, 145, 147, 151, 153, 166, 281<br />
823d: 337, 339-40, 360<br />
893d: 88<br />
Tank Destroyer Group, 7th: 327<br />
Tank destroyers: 119, 153, 321, 379, 396, 405, 453,<br />
455, 660<br />
76-mm SP: 230, 236, 309, 328<br />
German: 645, 654<br />
self-propelled: 126, 132-33, 191, 199, 653<br />
towed: 94, 126, 138, 147, 191, 199, 266, 337, 340,<br />
653<br />
Tanks: 223, 372, 513, 633. See also Armor.<br />
Crocodile (flame-throwing): 573<br />
guns: 652<br />
Jumbo: 503, 525, 652<br />
light: 89, 146, 188, 302<br />
losses: 125, 188, 190, 234, 296, 364, 384, 386, 405,<br />
513, 574, 647, 664<br />
medium: 116, 125-26, 190-91, 192, 239, 283, 296,<br />
302, 341, 405, 408-09, 466, 525, 583, 651-52, 664<br />
tank duels: 100, 125, 190, 193, 302, 366, 409, 652<br />
used for resupply and evacuation: 222, 254, 340<br />
Tanks, German: 71-72, 127, 264, 340, 642, 643. See<br />
also Armor.<br />
flame-thrower: 197<br />
losses: 92, 93, 94, 98, 104, 110, 111, 112, 115-17,<br />
117n, 125-27, 129-30, 131-32, 153, 164-65, 190,<br />
199-200, 203, 209, 261, 268, 283, 302-03, 340, 574,<br />
654, 661, 664<br />
Mark IV: 166, 178, 190, 191-92, 195,260,292, 295-<br />
96, 652<br />
Mark V (Panther): 115, 125-26, 133, 178, 192,<br />
195, 199, 260, 296, 302, 340-42, 396, 405, 409,<br />
417, 452, 525, 651-52<br />
Mark VI (Tiger): 61, 77, 110, 115, 125-26, 162,<br />
223, 260, 268, 328, 337, 339-40, 405, 651-52<br />
Tanks, German—Continued<br />
Mark VI (King Tiger) : 66, 652<br />
Tarchamps: 625<br />
Targnon: 341-42, 349<br />
T<strong>as</strong>k Forces. See also Teams.<br />
A (CCB, 2d Armored Division) : 568-69<br />
B (CCB, 2d Armored Division) : 568<br />
Blue: 621<br />
Booth: 298-99<br />
Boylan: 416-17, 419<br />
Brewster: 392, 584-87, 589-90<br />
Brown: 634<br />
Caraway: 322<br />
Chamberlain: 249, 253, 255, 483<br />
Collins: 615-16, 619-20<br />
Doan: 582n<br />
Erlenbusch: 406,416<br />
Ezell: 457, 514-15<br />
Hall: 233-34<br />
Hamilton: 541-44<br />
Harper: 295-96, 299<br />
Harrison: 364, 372-73, 376<br />
Hogan: 353, 378, 380-81, 384, 387, 593, 59 3n<br />
Jones: 397-400, 406, 417-21, 599<br />
Jordan: 349, 364<br />
Kane: 354, 381, 383-84, 386, 390-91, 583-84, 587,<br />
591<br />
Karsteter: 615-16, 621<br />
Lindsey: 415, 417<br />
Lohse: 416-17<br />
Lovelady: 348, 351, 364, 370, 372, 376<br />
Luckett: 246, 248, 250, 253<br />
Lyon: 515<br />
McGeorge: 348, 364, 373, 592, 592n, 596<br />
Mayes: 149-50, 281<br />
Navaho: 282n<br />
Orr: 354, 377-78, 380-81, 383, 386, 389, 391, 582,<br />
585, 593, 601<br />
Pat: 620, 644, 646<br />
Philbeck: 233<br />
Poker: 620-21, 644, 646<br />
Richardson: 383, 391-92, 591<br />
Riley: 250-51, 253-54, 257<br />
Rose: 295-96, 304, 315<br />
Rudder: 501<br />
Standish: 250, 253-54, 256, 500<br />
Thr<strong>as</strong>her: 559<br />
Tucker: 353-54, 358<br />
White: 621<br />
Taylor, Maj. Gen. Maxwell D.: 306, 553, 607, 630.<br />
See also Airborne Division, 10lst.<br />
Taylor, Col. William N.: 516, 536-37<br />
Teams<br />
Anderson: 472, 474<br />
Arnsdorf: 473<br />
Browne: 462, 464, 466-67,470-72<br />
Cherry: 296, 300, 303-4, 448, 450, 454, 471, 472-<br />
74
718 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Teams—Continued<br />
Desobry: 449, 452-53, 455<br />
Hyduke: 30-302, 448<br />
O’Hara: 451, 456-57, 471-72<br />
Palmaccio: 474<br />
Pyle: 464, 466<br />
Roberts: 472-74, 479<br />
Ryerson: 300-303, 448, 452, 454<br />
SNAFU: 460, 460n, 467, 473-74<br />
Van Kleef: 466<br />
Watts: 467<br />
Yantis: 466, 466n<br />
Tedder, Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur W.: 53, 509,<br />
611<br />
Telephone communications: 74, 83, 96, 101, 140,<br />
147, 152, 154, 181, 221, 229, 288, 321, 425, 654<br />
Templeton, Lt. Col. Clifford: 308<br />
Tenneville: 321, 429<br />
Terrain: 78, 142, 189-90, 194, 241, 249-50, 259-60,<br />
265, 267, 272, 353, 388-89, 428, 507, 510-11. See<br />
also Ardennes; Eifel.<br />
Thackerary, Lt. Col. Donald W.: 490n<br />
Theux: 346<br />
Thionville: 244, 249, 489-90<br />
Thommen: 414<br />
Thompson, Capt. Frederic C.: 498<br />
Thompson, 1st Lt. R. H.: 167n<br />
Thorne, Cpl. Horace M.: 403n<br />
Tiger tanks. See Tanks, German.<br />
Thr<strong>as</strong>her, Brig. Gen. Charles O.: 559<br />
Tillet: 325, 328-29, 466<br />
Tillison, Lt. Col. Arthur C.: 544<br />
Tintange: 54849, 607<br />
<strong>To</strong>dt Organization: 128, 222<br />
<strong>To</strong>ppe, Generalmajor Alfred: 68<br />
<strong>To</strong>si, Lt. Col. A. S.: 517<br />
<strong>To</strong>wne, Lt. Col. Josiah T.: 171<br />
Traffic and march control: 50, 260, 275, 277, 278,<br />
283, 292, 299, 302, 307, 309, 335, 396, 404, 410-<br />
11, 419, 436, 458, 490, 534, 623, 628-29, 657, 662,<br />
666. See also Withdrawal operations.<br />
Train, Col. William F.: 202, 420<br />
Training: 140, 193, 273, 512, 513<br />
Training, German: 77, 128, 177, 208, 215, 270-71,<br />
271n<br />
Travalini, Sgt. Savino: 84<br />
Trench foot: 123, 141, 238, 258, 495, 503<br />
Tri-le-Cheslaing: 590, 595<br />
Trier: 45, 61-62, 68, 212, 236, 240, 256, 661, 662<br />
Trois Ponts: 25, 259-60, 265, 267, 318, 336, 337,<br />
342-44, 346-18, 351-52, 355, 359, 364, 366, 369-<br />
72, 374, 376, 391, 395, 397, 401, 581, 587, 599-601<br />
Trois Vierges: 157, 199, 205, 294<br />
Troop movements: 50, 61-65, 70-71, 228, 240, 274-<br />
75, 309, 333n, 334, 357, 410, 434, 515, 601, 659,<br />
661, 665-66<br />
Troop Carrier Command IX: 172, 468<br />
Troop Carrier Group, 435th: 172<br />
Troop Carrier Group, 440th: 609<br />
Troop strength, Allied: 1, 25, 55-56, 650, 671, 674<br />
Troop strength, German: 1, 7, 9, 19, 22, 28, 71, 145,<br />
252, 533n 650, 671, 675<br />
Truppner, Lt. Stephen P:: 116<br />
Tucker, Maj. John: 353-54<br />
Tucker, Col. Reuben H., 3d: 352, 367, 581<br />
Tunnels: 66, 67<br />
Tupper, Col. Sevier R.: 643-44<br />
Tuttle, Lt. Col. Paul V., Jr.: 99, 101n<br />
Udenbreth: 77, 95-97<br />
Ulm: 67<br />
Urspelt: 188-91<br />
V-Leute: 255<br />
V-weapons: 19n, 561, 654-55, 667<br />
Van Der Kamp, T/Sgt. John: 362<br />
Van Every, Pfc. Gilbert: 455n<br />
Van Kleef: 466<br />
Vandenberg, Maj. Gen. Hoyt S.: 485<br />
Vandervoort, Lt. Col. Benjamin H.: 370<br />
Vaux Chavanne: 587<br />
Vaux-lez-Rosières: 210, 324, 327-28, 514, 533, 551-<br />
52, 615<br />
Venlo: 20, 25, 27, 29<br />
Verdenne: 442, 565, 574-77<br />
Verdun: 486-88, 509-10, 557, 560<br />
Verschneid: 148<br />
Verviers: 45, 77, 96, 259, 260, 274, 278<br />
Vesdre River: 75, 87, 669<br />
Vesoul: 20<br />
Vesqueville: 643<br />
Vianden: 43, 214-15, 219, 221<br />
Vichten: 515-16<br />
Viebig, Oberst Hans: 95<br />
Vielsalm: 139, 162, 205, 265, 273, 274-82, 285-87,<br />
289-91, 381, 390, 397, 399, 401, 402, 407, 409,<br />
413-21, 579-81, 598-600, 647<br />
Villages and village strongpoints: 42-43, 11 1, 116,<br />
137-38, 182-83, 192-93, 241, 247, 250, 253-54,<br />
256, 258, 272, 286, 324, 337-38, 340, 352, 366-67,<br />
379-80, 408-09, 416, 437-39, 451, 531, 542-43,<br />
552, 628<br />
Villeroux: 309, 464-66, 514, 615-16, 619, 621<br />
Villers-la-Bonne-Eau: 623-25, 627, 635-36, 643<br />
Villettes: 600<br />
Virton: 40, 45<br />
Volksdeutsch: 51, 143<br />
“Volkssturm”: 56<br />
Vosges: 611<br />
VT fuze. See Proximity fuze,<br />
Waal River: 51<br />
Wacht am Rhein: 21-22, 28, 30-32, 34-39<br />
Wagener, Generalmajor Carl Gustav: 475n,564<br />
Waha: 431, 574
lNDEX 719<br />
Wahlerscheid: 78, 86, 90, 101-04, 107-09, 111, 116,<br />
123, 216<br />
Wahlhausen: 180, 182, 186<br />
Waimes: 360, 569, 374, 603<br />
Waizenegger: 74<br />
Waldbillig 230-32, 234-37, 248, 250, 252-53, 255-<br />
57, 483-84, 499, 503<br />
Waldenburg, Generalmajor Siegfried von: 195, 197,<br />
357, 441-42, 575-77<br />
Waldron, Sgt. J. W.: 439<br />
Walker, Maj. Gen. Walton H.: 487, 489<br />
Wall, Lt. Col. Arnold R.: 630, 633<br />
Wallace, Capt. Claude D., Jr.: 451<br />
Wallendorf: 213, 228-29, 232, 235, 501<br />
Wallerode: 163, 167, 264, 277-78, 282-83, 292, 396,<br />
403-04<br />
Walsdorf: 217<br />
Walsh, S/Sgt. William: 367<br />
Wanlin: 433<br />
Wanne: 370<br />
War crimes trials: 260n, 262<br />
War economy, German: 3-6, 8, 8n, 9, 12, 15, 66, 68,<br />
675<br />
Wardin: 325, 451, 456, 629, 632-33<br />
Wark Creek: 227, 483, 522<br />
Warnach: 529-31, 548<br />
Warner, Cpl. Henry F.: 131n<br />
Warren, Lt. Col. Fred M.: 280<br />
W<strong>as</strong>serbillig: 21, 43, 44<br />
Watch on the Rhine. See Wacht am Rhein.<br />
Watts, Maj. Eugene A.: 467<br />
Weapons. See also entries by weapon type.<br />
comparison of <strong>US</strong> and German: 651-56<br />
dual-purpose: 653<br />
towed: 653, 658<br />
Weather: 46-47, 649-50<br />
effect on air operations: 18, 22, 38, 38n, 39, 61, 67,<br />
69, 142, 171, 366, 371-72, 467-68, 495-96, 660,<br />
663<br />
effect on ground operations: 146, 193, 229, 495,<br />
61 1<br />
Weber, Col. Alois : 534, 537-38<br />
Weckerath: 144, 146, 148, 155<br />
Wehrmacht. See German <strong>Army</strong>.<br />
Wehrmachtfuehiungsstab (WFSt): 11, 11n, 17, 19,<br />
23, 27, 34-35, 128, 381<br />
Weidingen: 207<br />
Weiler: 182-83, 185-86, 192<br />
Weiler-les Putscheid: 181<br />
Weismes: 129-30, 134-35<br />
Weissenhof crossroads: 153-54<br />
Weiswampach: 187, 203, 205, 219, 289<br />
Welchenhausen: 194, 197, 202<br />
Welford: 172<br />
Wellin: 433<br />
Welscheid: 517, 535, 537<br />
Wemple, Lt. Col. John P.: 280-81, 406, 414-16<br />
Wengerohr: 662<br />
Weppler: 160, 167, 284-85<br />
Werbomont: 25, 265, 267-68, 289, 307, 316, 336,<br />
342-43, 345-46, 346n, 347, 351, 378, 589-90, 597<br />
Wereth: 150, 161-63<br />
Werfer. See Rocket projectors.<br />
West Wall: 3, 13-15, 36, 40, 51, 55, 57, 78, 80, 82, 87,<br />
95-96, 101, 103, 108, 137-38, 140, 142, 144, 148,<br />
151, 177, 180, 194-95, 198, 330, 428, 485-86, 489<br />
504, 506, 508, 512,658,672<br />
Westerwald: 40<br />
Westbrook, 2d Lt. R. L.: 285n<br />
Westphal, General der Kavellerie Siegfried: 21-23,<br />
25, 29, 33, 36, 675<br />
Weyland, Brig. Gen. Otto P.: 424, 496, 625<br />
Weywertz: 81<br />
WFSt. See Wehrmachtfuehrungsstab.<br />
Wheeler, Lt. Crawford: 154<br />
Wheeler, Col. Richard B.: 622<br />
White, Brig. Gen. Isaac D.: 441, 568-69<br />
White phosphorus: 129, 296, 340, 399, 496, 546<br />
Whitehill, 2d Lt. John A.: 550n<br />
Whiteley, Maj. Gen. J. F. M.: 423<br />
Widener, Sgt. William J.: 350<br />
Wiedorfer, Sgt. Paul J.: 549<br />
Williams, Lt. Col. Earle: 273<br />
Williams, Lt. Col. H. R.: 214<br />
Williams, Cpl. Hale: 130<br />
Willis, 1st Sgt. Gervis: 247n<br />
Wiltz: 184, 188, 191-93, 206-10, 215, 219, 221-22,<br />
313, 315, 323, 328, 457-58, 508, 513, 520, 522,<br />
541, 545, 547, 628, 632, 637, 640-42<br />
Wiltz River: 44, 206-07, 215, 219, 294, 299, 312, 454,<br />
457, 510, 520, 522, 640, 658<br />
Wiltz-B<strong>as</strong>togne highway: 637, 640, 642<br />
Wilwerwiltz: 181, 187, 206, 312-13<br />
Winterscheid: 155<br />
Winterspelt: 151, 152-54, 157-61, 284, 292<br />
Winterspelt-St. Vith highway: 137, 141, 275, 285<br />
Wire. See Obstacles; Telephone communications.<br />
Wirtzfeld: 104-09, 112-13, 115, 117, 120, 122-23, 128,<br />
604<br />
Wischeid: 149<br />
Withdrawal operations: 93, 99-101, 104-06, 107-12,<br />
116, 122-23, 133, 148-50, 160-61, 162-69, 191-<br />
92, 202, 203, 209-10, 223-26, 232, 234-35, 254,<br />
256-57, 297, 297n, 298, 30243, 370, 376, 443,<br />
455, 589, 593, 599-600. See also St. Vith.<br />
Withee, Cpl. Edward S.: 155, 155n<br />
Wittlich: 45, 177<br />
Wolf’s Lair: 1, 15-16, 21, 24, 27, 31<br />
Wollenberg, Pvt. Richard: 130<br />
Wood, Maj. Gen. John S.: 512-13<br />
Wood, Lt. Col. W. C.: 626<br />
Woodruff, Capt. Junior R.: 390<br />
Woods fighting: 78, 230, 234, 290, 402-03, 407, 493,<br />
497-98, 532, 548-49<br />
Woodward, Maj. Walden F.: 196, 203<br />
World War I: 6, 11, 39-40, 46, 48, 64, 480, 611, 649,<br />
654, 656<br />
Wurtich, Lt. Jake: 370
720 THE ARDENNES: BATTLE OF THE BULGE<br />
Yale, Col. Wesley W.: 618, 620, 646-47<br />
Yantis, 1st Lt. Ray J.: 466n<br />
Yates, Maj. Robert B.: 267-68<br />
Yeomans, Lt. Col. Prentice E.: 353-54<br />
Ziegenberg: 23<br />
Zimmerer, Pfc. T. J.: 234n<br />
Zimmermann, Generalleuthant Bobo: 23<br />
Zweibrucken: 512<br />
is U S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 1993 333-169
THE SEVENTH ARMY ATTACK<br />
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